Freefall
by esama
Summary: While looking for a Horcrux from the Antarctica, Harry stumbles upon the Stargate - and through it to Atlantis. Warnings for lot of OCs and slight lack of logic. Drabble story.
1. 1 to 50

**Freefall**

1.

Harry refines his concepts of humanity and magic and what is and isn't possible pretty soon after he realises what the room he finds himself in is, and how exactly he had gotten there. That, though, takes time, because seeing something is far from understanding it, and understanding is not easy to achieve. Atlantis, though, helps him there, whispering at the edges of his consciousness, directing his feet through the halls that light up around him, even as the city shakes and trembles.

Elizabeth Weir, however, is the one who makes sense of the madness lapping at his awareness, making everything clear.

2.

Elizabeth is old when he finds her, having slept ten thousand years, and Harry is young, having stumbled where he wasn't supposed to be well ahead of his time. But Atlantis guides his feet and he guides her with his hand, to a chamber he doesn't know he knows how to find, but which Atlantis lights up and makes work. She sits still and waits as the city reads her and learns to understand her, and under the gentle touch of the healing mechanisms she slowly grows young again.

3.

Around them the city continues to shake, but Elizabeth tells him not to be afraid. "The city will rise," she says, still leaning to him because being young again - younger than she was, even - does not repair atrophied muscles or make her joints forget eons of stillness. "It's best to let it happen." And so Harry does nothing but try to understand, as Atlantis sings for the sun and air and quivers with excitement of being free again.

4.

They sit huddled like lost children they are, as the city makes for its lunge. Elizabeth tells him of confidentiality and missions and Stargate and how they were in another galaxy, while Harry tells her of magic and wizards and how he had gotten lost in the Antarctic, looking for a hidden piece of a murderer's soul. He doesn't understand her tale, and she doesn't understand his, but it doesn't matter because they both share the fright and loneliness and awe, as the spires of Atlantis breach the surface.

5.

Harry holds Elizabeth's hand tightly, as they slowly walk along the halls that now bathe in the light of an alien sun. She is steadier now, but not yet sturdy, as she tells him stories about the Ancients and their magnificent civilisation, and time travel and how it had taken her out of time, of how she was actually from Earth, from future and past all at once, and that it would be alright if he didn't understand.

Harry says nothing, just thinks of the Horcrux he hadn't found - maybe the information had been wrong - and about whether he had stumbled onto Atlantis accidentally or not. Because regardless of how difficult she made finding Atlantis seem, he had only stumbled onto the frozen gate, rested his hand on it and the shimmering blue water had erupted to life.

6.

"You must've found the Antarctic gate," Elizabeth explains to him. "Ninety seven, you say? That would be just year or so before we found the gate in my timeline - it was discovered in ninety eight, actually. Had you been few months later, you might've never found it."

Harry doesn't really understand, but he's glad regardless - the hypothermia had been getting to him when the gate had activated, and had it not been there, he isn't sure if he had survived.

7.

Elizabeth dwells on his being there for a while longer, but Harry gets distracted as the city hums around him, just loud enough to be heard, but quiet enough not to overwhelm him. He wonders at it for a while, about a technology that could feel and sound like it, about the fact that Elizabeth seems completely deaf to it, before another thought pierces through the confusion and discoveries. "How will I get home?"

Elizabeth stops at that, but doesn't say anything. It doesn't take more than that for Harry to realise that leaving wouldn't be as easy, as arrival had been.

8.

There were power issues and security issues - because even if they did manage to get enough power to send him back, he would be sent into the Stargate Command, and it would be trickier for him to get back to his life from there. "It's a secret project," Elizabeth tries to explain, but Harry has already figured out. It's like muggle stumbling upon the Department of Mysteries - they wouldn't be allowed to walk out just like that either.

"And I don't know… if the timeline is still intact. It might be that what happened in my past will not happen here - you might be herald of that," Elizabeth says, though whether she is trying to convince him or reassure him or what, he doesn't know. "You do not exist in my time line as far as I know; your people do not exist. It might be that… the Stargate program was never really started."

They share histories and world views and tell each other what they know of what world is like - and there are similarities, but also some differences, and together they worry about the time and whether either of them can go back anymore.

9.

"First things first," Harry says finally, after hours have gone by, and human needs start to make themselves known. "Whatever has or hasn't happened, and whatever will happen aside, we need to survive _now_." He brings out what food he has with him, and makes rations - she watches, amazed, as he increases the size of his stores by ten fold. Then she takes him to see where they would get water and where they would be able to bathe, and finally shocks him with the Ancient matter converters - that, among hundreds of other things, can make food.

"Ancients had to eat too," she says, smiling as she tries the odd porridge she had made. "I think we need to refine what is and isn't edible for the machines though," she adds, grimacing and pushing the angular bowl away from herself.

10.

They sleep in the same room, as Atlantis is big and empty and a little intimidating, and after the first night it becomes a habit. As the days go by and Harry learns to accept Atlantis and his odd, free confinement in her endless halls, Elizabeth replicates fabrics for duvets, curtains and carpets, and makes shelves to fill with items. Soon she fills their combined room with meaningless things that give the illusion of it being normal - of it being home. And though the natural hues of white and beige and brown aren't among his favourites, Harry says nothing against it.

He knows the power and security simple illusions can give.

11.

"What will we do?" Harry asks. They have years ahead of them, and he doesn't know what to think of that - doesn't know how to handle that. He comes from war and action, and being in empty city with nothing to do makes him feel like a ghost.

Elizabeth considers the question, and comes up with many options for him to choose from. "We can do nothing, and wait. I can teach you Ancient language and we can learn to operate Atlantis - we can certainly survive here, well enough," she offers, and he decides against it immediately. "We could… explore the galaxy outside," she then says and motions at the silent Stargate. "There are many planets out there. We could find power sources for Atlantis - we will need them, we already do."

12.

But they can't, really. Not together, in any case. Neither dares to leave the city alone because it's all they have and in odd way they are all it has too. They are responsible of its care, because they are _there_, and there will be no one else for years - maybe ever. But Harry is anxious and he has to move, has to run, has to do something. So they decide. He will go.

Elizabeth tells him stories and drills him in procedures, making him as ready as she can for all possibilities. She replicates equipment and weapons, making bastardized mixture of earth military uniforms and vests and what the Ancients wore, and Harry covers it with a dark brown cloak that makes him feel a bit more like himself. Harry practices with the ancient energy weapon until his aim with it is almost as good as it is with his wand - while Elizabeth tinkers with the converter, and then produces him dozen spare wands, identical to the one he has down to its very molecules.

It's odd, it's foreign and yet it's oddly relieving, when he attaches the Ancient communication crystal to his collar, and steps out of Atlantis.

13.

The first planet he visits, the first in the list of five Elizabeth carried with her through the ages, is empty and dead, with only plants and animals inhabiting what was once a town or city of some sort. It's all in ruins now, bombarded by fire that no spell short of Fiendfyre could manage, ruined beyond repair and beyond recognition. When he comes back with nothing but a sad tale to tell, Elizabeth tells him about what the place had been, what it had been for - and the war that had no doubt ruined it.

"Why did they destroy a training facility?" he asks, a little shocked as he hears that once upon a time, ten thousand years ago, Ancient children had enjoyed their first school years in the very ruins he had just visited.

"Because they can, I imagine," Elizabeth answers.

14.

Harry learns to fly the Atlantean ships more out of curiosity than actual need, after hearing how John Sheppard of Elizabeth's expedition had known how to fly one just after sitting into it. The ship feels alive under Harry's hand like broom never has, and when the ceiling opens above him, it's a dare he can't ignore.

Unlike with broom, the freedom of flying is more in the speed than in the manoeuvrability, but it feels the same. And with broom, Harry could've never broken the sound barrier like he does on a space ship - not to even mention about visiting the outer space, and then returning without no more effort or trouble, than upwards tilt of the control rods and a thought.

15.

The second planet he visits is much livelier. There is a town near the gate, and the people welcome him with open arms, asking his tale, offering him theirs. He listens them quietly as they tell of the Wraith and cullings and how time and time again people had lost their brothers and sisters, and how their town had been rebuild and rebuild and rebuild. They think he knows it too, thinking that he is a survivor; they ask him what happened to his parents, if he needs a place to stay. They offer him that place, just as long as he can pitch in - there is a harvest coming up, they need people in the fields.

He leaves the planet with a bag of grain and some vegetables, feeling oddly broken hearted.

Elizabeth sends him back with a barrel of replicated spices and a fertilizer that might make their lives a little easier.

16.

Harry has never really cared much for puzzles, even though he has been solving them one way or another since he had been young. The puzzle of the Brotherhood of Fifteen doesn't take him by surprise, exactly, but it doesn't make him feel much gratified either. Still, he steels his resolve and tries it - mostly because he wants to take Elizabeth something more than food they don't need and tales they aren't happy to hear. He examines the stones they had found and helps people dig - and then cheats outrageously one evening when the clues aren't forthcoming.

_Accio_ brings all the pieces together and _point-me_-charm takes him to the chamber, where he looks at the pedestal for a moment before detaching the power source with a _revelio _and a well aimed_ bombarda._

It is late and Harry is too tired for pleasantries, and so world of Dagan never finds out that the Potentia left it's soil that unassuming night.

17.

Elizabeth reverently hooks the ZPM, as she calls it, to the power conduit of the city, and Harry listens with closed eyes how to city sings a silent note of gratitude. Systems that were dormant activate and data that had lain stale continue filling as the sensors come back online, and Atlantis truly awakens from her ten thousand years of sleep.

"Now what?" Harry asks, because he knows that with this he could go back home, _they_ could go back home - they could try at least. They have enough power to open a gate to Milkyway, now.

Elizabeth frowns, and doesn't answer.

18.

Elizabeth tells him of timelines and preservation of events, and how it was imperative that certain things happened in a certain way, and how they might ruin that if they made contact. Then she speaks of the gate security back earth, of the iris that protects the gate, and how the SGC would never let them in without the right code. The she speaks of the Goa'uld and the war and the battles, and the good they had done, and how it could all turn horribly wrong. And finally she quietly says that it might not even exists, that the Stargate might still be under lock and key in some warehouse - maybe it was never discovered at all.

They are all excuses, Harry knows it, spoken to hide the fact that she wants to hold hope and not have it neither proven nor negated. He thinks of Voldemort and the war, the Horcruxes and his friends and Hogwarts and all the things he missed. He worries and wonders; it has been weeks already, what if everything is lost, what if his friends are dead, what if Voldemort has truly won? He thinks all this… and yet, when Elizabeth looks at him, hopeful and concerned, he nods.

"Best wait," he says.

19.

She studies the ancient data base and makes silent discoveries in Atlantis, while he goes out and visits other worlds, making tentative friends here and there, and swearing never to return to certain worlds. He saves a life once in a world where days are incredibly short, and in answer Torren Emmagan swears to keep the power Harry had used save him a secret. He ends another once in planet where the sun was strangely blue and people lived in caves, and never speaks of it again.

It's been two months since he had stumbled through the gate and to Atlantis, when he discovers empty village, smoke still trickling up from fires that had burned out hours ago with no one left to tend to them. He walks around, trying to find people, trying to find out what happened. He's almost ready to give up, when he discovers handful of women and children, huddling in a shelter underneath a burned building, barely alive.

When he calls Elizabeth, he hates her a little for hesitating at all before allowing him to bring the people back with him to Atlantis.

20.

The Elosians are steady, quiet people, what little there is left of them. Eight women and seventeen children of varying ages, and not a single male older than twelve. Elizabeth worries meld at the sight of them and as Harry watches she gently shows them places to sleep in, water to drink, food to eat and clothes to wear. They are awed by Atlantis and terrified, but they are so worn and so tired, that they can do little but eat and sleep for the following two days.

"What will we do with them?" Elizabeth asks later, looking more thoughtful than worried now, because it is obvious that the tired women and their young offer them no danger.

"We will take care of them," Harry says, and feels secure in the purpose of being he had been lacking before.

21.

Elizabeth shows the women how to use the converter and how to navigate the city, while Harry teaches them how to understand it. He is more like them than Elizabeth is and despite her disapproving frown, they take the misconceptions he gives a little better than the hard facts and truths she offers. She would tell them of technology and lineages, of physics and electronics. He, on other hand, tells them of magic and wonder and paints Atlantis in the hues he sees it - in hues of fantasy.

To live in city of incredible advanced technology might be alright for Elizabeth, but the Elosians - and for Harry - magic is much more comforting. In time they would learn to accept the truth, but for the time being they took comfort in the sweet lies.

22.

"We will do what we can," Tana, the eldest of the Elosian women, says, determined and eager to pay back for the kindness they felt had been offered them. So Elizabeth teaches her people how "to do magic" with Atlantis, how to produce food and clothes and whatever other things they might need, while Harry teaches them to listen to the sounds Atlantis made, to the song she quietly sung. The children learn it, he soon finds, much easier than the adults, but even they cannot hear it like he does.

They can hear it well enough to warn the rest of Atlantis meagre population of a flood that threatens to take over one of the sections - and soon enough for Harry to repair the damage and prevent it.

23.

It is hard to explain the children, who see Harry performing miracles with a waved wand, that it's not ability he can teach. "You have to be born with it," he says, over and over again, until they give up and just ask him to do this and that again.

It's much harder explaining to the women that, just because he alone has the ability, they don't immediately need to make sure it survives to the next generation. And even then, Tana never really stops saying how important it was to pass knowledge on, and the other women never stop suggesting that it's never too early to have children.

"They come from civilisation that did what it could to survive," Elizabeth says, explaining to him that among Elosians, there had been no such thing as marriage and that a woman's worth had been measured in her children. It doesn't make Harry feel all that guilty for turning the offers down - he is still only seventeen, after all, and in his own opinion much too young for kids, regardless of the fact that Elosian women didn't expect any input from their men.

24.

One of the women, Carin, becomes Harry's partner while traversing the other worlds. She has three children, one of them still young enough to need breast feeding, but she was the daughter of the village chief and thus she knows many worlds. While the other women take care of her young, she teachers Harry more about survival and understanding in Pegasus Galaxy, than his own journeys have managed so far.

She tells him that the Elosians call him and Elizabeth the Guardians, and Harry can never quite manage to figure out what to say to that.

25.

In a world where the Elosians made allies, Harry and Carin offers to help with the harvest for a day in exchange for some items and fabrics, things they don't exactly need as they can have them all made with the matter converter, but which they'd just generally like to have in _real_ _form_. It's a thing for them now, and it's not just about trade. Adna, one of the Elosians, still sews four hours every evening, and why Miran had Elizabeth make her some cooking gear - and why now all of the Elosians were learning about Atlantean hydroponics.

"One should not learn to rely on magic, when it is such a wild force," Tana says, but Harry knows where they are coming from. Sometimes just having things isn't enough - sometimes it's more about _making_ them and knowing how genuine they were.

26.

The first time Harry steps through the gate and right into a culling, his reaction is sharp and immediate. While Carin pulls out her energy weapon, Harry grabs his wand and chants shields and protections, turning people invincible and silent and unseen. Then he aims at the dart like space ships screaming across the sky, and he fires spell after spell until a _reducto_ bring one of the machines down, and _stupefy_ sends another reeling into distance.

He's still shivering with the magical exhaustion after Carin has killed two Wraith to save him, and they have gathered the surviving Haneen from the smoking ruins of their camp, and taken them back to Atlantis.

27.

"This has to stop," Elizabeth says, a little wild with worry as she and Harry watch how the Elosians welcome the Haneen with open arms, and show them places to stay. "We can't just bring in every person you encounter out there -"

"Why not?" Harry asks. "We certainly have the space."

He can see the struggle of morale and duty in her eyes, because as much as she had came to Pegasus as a explorer, there was also a bit of a conquer in her, and even now she feels like Atlantis ought to belong to the expedition that might or might not come in seven years' time. He says nothing, only takes the decision from her hands, and says, "If we don't help, then what are we worth?"

The guilt stops her from bringing up the security issues until the following day.

28.

The Haneen mourn their dead in two day ceremony that fill the halls with smoke of incense and low tone singing. A young woman, the chosen _Death_ of the mourning, walks bare footed in a white gown from family to family with a low ringing bell and cup of smoking herbs in her hands, speaking the names of their dead and telling them stories of the afterlife. Harry watches this from the side, and sees the Elosians join it with whispers of the men and women of Elos that had died.

"I suppose we're all human," Elizabeth murmurs, and though it's not the last time she disagrees with the concept of taking in refugees, she is not as adamant about it afterwards.

29.

The Elosians and the Haneen get along surprisingly well, despite their differences. The Haneen are spiritual people, their marriages were life long, their beliefs were strong as steel, their faith was unshakeable, while the Elosians only believe in realism and survival, on material things. The free-mindedness of Elosian women shake the Haneen men, but surprisingly enough the Haneen women, warriors just like their men are, seem to see the point behind it. Their children eye each other from the distance for a while, but _Wraiths and Warriors_ seems to be game most Pegasus children knew, and thus a common language between them.

To Harry's mild worry, the Haneen take the name the Elosians had given him and Elizabeth, and completely blow it out of proportions. "We defer to the Guardians, in all things," they say, and bow every time they see Harry or Elizabeth. It kills every worry Elizabeth has about the newcomers trying to usurp the fragile chain of command Atlantis has, but it doesn't endear itself to Harry in the slightest.

"You met the Wraith in a way we could not, throwing colourful fire at them and bringing them down from the skies," Ihar, one of the Haneen warriors, says. "Your title is well earned." And that is that.

30.

Harry educates the Haneen in the use of Lantean hand-held weapons, handing energy weapons to all of them, even the women. They show their gratitude by giving him blades and armours and protective charms that they carry with them to battle - one of them gives him a jar of expensive incense, telling him it was burned in high celebrations and before important battles. Harry, feeling a little overwhelmed, answers by roping Elizabeth into making a proper forgery so that the Haneen could continue making their armours and weapons. They reply by giving him the ceremonial blade their previous tribe leader had carried before the Wraith had taken him, effectively naming him their tribe leader. Harry responds to that by introducing them to the concept of stainless steel and proper boots, among half dozen other little things that make them smidge better fighters than before.

It continues on for a while, until the Haneen, in brutally short ceremony that he had no way of stopping or refusing, give one of their young warriors to be his _Haran_ for life - his servant and bodyguard. Afran, the warrior, ignores all his refusals and denials and firmly plants himself to his side, by all appearances with every intention of standing there forever.

"You could've done worse," Carin notes, as she looks over the tall warrior with appreciative eyes, and it doesn't really help much.

31.

Harry can't rebuke Afran for long, though, not when the young warrior saves his life no less than three times when Harry takes him and Carin for another venture off world. World that had supposed to be empty and abandoned aside from ruined ancient outpost is teeming with Wraith, and they only make it back through the gate because Afran was strong enough to carry both Harry and Carin after they had been stunned.

It effectively ends all hopes Harry had of ever being freed of his _Haran_ guard, but he doesn't mind it as much as he did in the beginning.

32.

Time goes by, and Atlantis becomes something more than just a place they are. It's a home in way nothing in Earth ever was - not just because it's a place where they can be safe and be people, but because it's a place they are, in a way, making. Elizabeth, for all her worries, is the first to acknowledge it. She changes the fake items in their room - which they still, after all the time, share - into _real_ ones made by the Elosians and the Haneen. Harry, on other hand, feels that he acknowledges it a bit deeper.

While Elizabeth ventures deeper into the database and teaches their new people how to read the Ancient language and how to do magic with their machines, Harry ventures deeper into the _people_. He learns the Haneen songs and dances and Afran teaches him the _Her__-taan_ fighting style, which forces him to lift his feet higher than anything else ever has. He learns to cook Elosian dishes and has many great days just making _things_ with the women, regardless of how it wasn't men's work. He learns to weave fabrics and sew complicated stitches the Elosians use and one day he makes a potter's wheel just so that that he can make himself the ceremonial incense cup every Haneen has.

He doesn't intend it, but the more he does it, the more the people look up to him.

33.

The third race they take in, is not taken in because of attack and immediate risk - the Garoush had lost their home months ago. Harry learns of them through the Athosians, who are one of the many people they trade with. The Garoush had been attacked and their homes burned not by Wraith, but another human race who had escaped through the gate with all their cattle and wealth. They could've survived the attack, if the fire that hadn't escalated and burned down the forests and the fields until nothing was left to support their people. Ever since then, the Garoush had been living as guests of the Athosians, but the game in Athos wasn't enough to support both tribes.

"We will work," Adarr, the leader of the Garoush, promises desperately when Harry sits down with him. "We will earn our stay, anyway we can. We can still trade some; get some animals to start over with…"

"I think we can work something out," Harry promises, wondering how Atlantis would handle livestock.

34.

Elizabeth argues against the Garoush like she argued against the Haneen and the Elosians, but it doesn't last for long. Harry thinks she is getting adjusted to the way of being he had somehow managed to install - it's not what she had been expecting, but she can't see that many things wrong with it, and in the end the pros outweigh the cons.

"We can't really throw them to the dogs, I suppose," Elizabeth adds, as she eyes one of the many big hounds the Garoush bring with them. As a people who mainly lived by their cattle, the Garoush have dozens of extremely well trained stock dogs that had been helping them with the cattle - the robbers hadn't been able to steal them like they had stolen the livestock, so now the dogs are all they have. It endears the Garoush to Elizabeth quicker than even the Elosians had managed - she, surprisingly enough, is a dog person.

On Harry's quiet suggestion, the Garoush give Elizabeth two of the puppies when one of their dogs has a litter.

35.

Though the Garoush obviously would prefer to continue living as they had, Atlantis is not equipped for their lifestyle - and they don't want to live in the mainland, when it would mean being cut off the gate. Instead, they turn to the Elosians and the Haneen, and quietly begin learning their ways. The women of the Garoush quickly learn to understand Hydroponics, and start to do their damnest to fill Atlantis with greenery, while the men begin assimilating the Haneen fighting methods into their own - their own being no longer sufficient, as they no longer had their mounds

They still keep their traditions, and every morning majority of the Garoush tribe gather in one of the larger halls to weave, sew, mend their equipment and make some new ones, and every evening their sit down again to eat, drink, sing, and retell old stories. And when the Elosian women carefully join them in the mornings and the Haneen in the evenings, they welcome them with open arms.

Harry, who watches them from the side, has to wonder about the easy unity his people seem to have. "Power of mutual suffering, mutual enemies, and mutual survival," Afran says, and it makes sad sort of sense.

36.

When the Garoush realise that Harry has one Elosian and one Haneen in his "team", they insist that one of them joins it as well. Harry has nothing against it up until the point they present him the pompous son of their chief, who looks down at Carin and tries to challenge Afran on several occasions. When on a simple visit to meet one of Atlantis's trading partners, he nearly ends all good will Harry has managed to build with the Olatains, Harry quickly puts an end to it.

He chooses instead the daughter of a Garoush healer, who has quiet and pleasant manners, and who knows hundred and one remedies to heal a sick animal. Lian nearly declines the offer when her father commands it, but Carin has a quiet talk with her and Afran has a staring competition with his father, and in the end everyone _defers to the will of the Guardian_.

"I hope you know what you're doing," Elizabeth notes, after the Garoush do everything except give him Lian's hand in marriage to get back to his good graces.

"Me too," Harry mutters, and leads his team out through the gate for another off world excursion

37.

Not all the worlds he visits are as welcoming as the others. Some see him and try to chase him away, others try to imprison him. Once he uses magic to save a child and is very nearly behead for it. He is very glad of Carin's strength of will and Afran's general strength as they negotiate and then out right blackmail him away from the gallows - not to mention about Lian's ability to patch up his neck before he bleeds to death.

It sparks up the first of many arguments from the people of Atlantis, who all soon think it would be much better if their Guardian just stayed where he was safe - in the city. They argue that they can do the negotiations and trading with other worlds just as well, and the exploration would be better handled by someone not quite so valuable. Elizabeth, who has started having some troubles keeping command when ever Harry was gone, seems to agree. Harry, however, doesn't - especially not when his progeny enter the argument yet again.

But he takes a month off anyway - if for no other reason, then to let his neck heal.

38.

In his downtime, Harry does more magic than he has in a while. He hasn't ever truly ignored the city's needs, but now he has the time to attend to the little dissonances in her singing, and spend some extra time curing Atlantis's little cuts and scrapes with _reparos_ and such. His team follows him and watches, as he puts broken consoles together and melds shattered crystals and repairs all other breaks he can find.

"What does she say?" Lian asks cautiously as Harry runs his hand over stained glass, that had been wrecked a moment before.

Harry doesn't really know how to put it. Atlantis sings of function and survival, of ten thousand years of loneliness and of children - she sings of new dawn she sees in her new people, and she sings of the purpose of being she has after so long. She also sings of subroutines and sensor readings, she sings of temperature and working mechanisms, the hundred thousand little things she does every second of every day, fulfilling her age old duty. "Right now, she's singing of peace," he answers, and it feels like telling both a lie and a secret that wasn't his to divulge.

39.

When Elizabeth "moves out" of their joined room with her things and her two rabidly growing puppies, Harry doesn't really mind, though he feels oddly empty for a while. He knows, in odd way that needs no evidence, that she has taken interest in one of the Haneen men, and that is why she wants privacy, which is why he doesn't say anything to it. She is older than him in any case, and deserves her life - deserves not to know how lonely it makes him feel.

He is secretly grateful when Afran, never satisfied with having a room all the way across the corridor, demands that he'd get to occupy the second bed in Harry's room.

40.

Harry and his little team build their own traditions in the multitude of habits that fall in their places in Atlantis. They eat together, with Harry and Carin making the food in odd mixture of Earth cooking and the Elosian dishes. They walk together, with Harry at the lead while Afran follows from the behind, and Carin hovering protectively over Lian who is the smallest. They practice together, with Afran teaching them all how to fight with their bodies while Harry teaches them how to aim, and Lian showing how to bandage the wounds afterwards.

Some days, they will play with Carin's children who, despite the fact that children are the duty of Elosian women, start to feel like _theirs_. Harry learns how to hold an infant Kara while Afran devices practice weapons for six year old Rair and Lian teaches Carin's four year old daughter Naun how to braid her hair in the Garoush way that uses many ribbons. It's comforting and peaceful and private, and Harry thinks it feels rather like a family would.

41.

Harry is called - requested, _pleaded_ - to come in and help a world in middle of a culling. He and his team can do nothing about it by the time they make there - the Wraith are gone, the people are shattered, the houses are burning - but the people of Fourth Ranor still thank him as he gently aids them trough the gate, and to Atlantis.

The Ran are different from the other three races Harry has helped - they are older and wearier, as Fourth Ranor had been only the latest in long line of planets they had escaped to. They still have their ten thousand year old sciences and beliefs and knowledge, only they had been destroyed so many times that the rough outside no longer matched the knowledgeable inside. Their medicine is more advanced than that of Earth, they carry aged but advanced weapons that match the Lantean energy weapons, and their faith is old and powerful.

Elizabeth hears of their knowledge and welcomes them with enthusiasm she hasn't shown for the others. Her reaction, more than anything else, is the herald of a new age in Atlantis.

42.

"I'm sorry, I don't really know anything about Ascension," Harry apologises, when group of the Ran approaches him on the matter, thinking that his magic is the sign of someone approaching Ascension. They are confused and curious and have him perform tricks like he sometimes does for the children of Atlantis, and in the end they join the chorus started by the Elosians about how he should have some children, and soon, so that the ability can be passed on.

"You could at least offer your genetic material," Kiran, one of the Ran medical specialists, says. To them artificial insemination was nothing but one more method to ensure their race's continued survival, but for Harry it opens a can of worms he doesn't know how to handle.

43.

"Half a year now," Elizabeth says once, as they watch how Elosians negotiate the trade of certain materials with off-world allies. "Five and half years to go. Or more." Which is strange, because it feels so much longer - and in the same time, so much shorter. Atlantis is becoming livelier and stronger, now housing population of nearly one thousand, majority of them made of Garoush and Ran, and judging by the women of Atlantis, it is only getting livelier.

The glint in Elizabeth's eyes, indicating that she wouldn't have minded getting lively herself, makes Harry worry even more than the concept of artificial insemination had.

44.

Harry escapes the problem of progeny into off-world excursions, meeting more people and seeing more Wraith-born chaos. He makes friends and tries to avoid enemies - which isn't always possible - and every now and then runs into a culture so bizarre that Wizarding world seems sane in comparison. His team falls in step with him, no longer his partners or followers, but his friends, his sisters and his brother, willing to put up with him and talk him down whenever necessary.

When ever they can, they bring something new back with them to Atlantis - food, clothes, items, whatever they can find to liven up the lives of their people. Sometimes when they can't find anything else, they spend half an hour gathering wild flowers for no other reason except because they can.

When they run into the gigantic ship in a planet so scorched by sun that the word _desert_ doesn't seem hot enough, however, it takes some time to figure out what to do with it.

45.

"A ship, Harry?" Elizabeth asks for the fifth time, as Harry and Carin describe what they found half buried in the sand. "A space ship?"

"A really big space ship," Harry agrees. "Huge, in fact." For him it doesn't really mean anything, but Elizabeth gets a look in her eyes as he tells her about how _familiar_ the design seems - "Could've been one of the spires of Atlantis, really," - and that it looks like it had been empty for a long while. The look only gets more pronounced the further he goes, until finally she calls in the Ran scientists, and they begin plotting a return trip.

46.

When Elizabeth decides that they could use a space ship of their own, the Ran prove out to be invaluable. It's easy to forget the extend of their skills and knowledge, because they dress no different than the Elosians and the Haneen do, but still, technology is nothing difficult for them. Harry knows he will never forget again, as he watches with amazement how they coax the ship's computers back online and determine its origins and the reasons it had crashed, and whether or not they can make any good out of it.

"It is Ancestor design," Irana, the head scientist of the Ran, explains, after they had managed to get the right consoles and screen working. "Shot down during the war, I imagine. It was near the end of the war, I believe, because the Ancestor's didn't have the time to repair the engines." Time however is something the current Lanteans do have, and so the ship, the Preliator, becomes the new salvaging project of Atlantis.

47.

The project has an odd effect on the people of Atlantis. Majority of them have no idea what they would do with something like Preliator, even if they knew how, but they all know one thing; the Wraith have space ships. That is how the Wraith destroy worlds; they come down on their ships from the heavens. For the current Lanteans, to have a ship of their own, one that might even rival the sheer awe-inspiring power of the Wraith vessels…

Atlantis was a sanctuary before, even for those who do not understand the true protections it offered. It was a safe place to rest, knowing that the magic of the Ancestors was watching over them. But now it seems different. "With this ship, we could fight back, yes?" one of the Haneen asks, and it sums the whole thing up nicely.

Suddenly, they have more than just a safe place. Suddenly, they have _hope_ - and not just for them, but perhaps also for all those they know.

48.

"They seem so revitalised now, that I can't really force myself to do it," Elizabeth admits quietly under her breath, as the Ran rush back and forth in the gateroom, ready to begin their salvaging operation - ready to begin reviving the mighty giant that had slumbered in the sands for so long, waiting.

"Do what?" Harry asks, though he has a feeling what she means.

She gives him a awkward, almost sad, almost sarcastic smile. "Tell them that the Ancients had hundreds of ships just like the Preliator - and they lost."

He doesn't look at her for a while, just thinks it through. "Probably better you don't try," he finally says, and turns to join the crew about to head off world.

49.

Atlantis is incredible, too big to truly comprehend and so advanced that she is frightening at times, but the _Preliator_ is different. It isn't just _there_ like Atlantis is - it is there for a _reason_. The Preliator was made for a purpose that even ten thousand years after it crashed makes it identifiable to the natives of Pegasus galaxy - purpose that for them has always been their life. It is a _fighter_, created solely to fight the Wraith.

That is probably why almost everyone in Atlantis takes the opportunity to visit the fallen giant while the Ran rummage through its systems, trying to revive it. That is why neither Harry nor Elizabeth does a thing to stop them from visiting the ship. The Elosian women take their children while the Haneen go in warrior groups and the Ran very nearly move into the ship completely. Together and alone they walk the Preliator's silent corridors and run their hands over its walls and feel connected to it in way they don't experience with Atlantis. Atlantis is _home_ and thus important, but Preliator is a _brother in arms_.

It might've as well been blood related to the people of Atlantis.

50.

It takes two months for the Preliator to regain some of its former strength. Harry visits the ship often with his team, offering his magic to its aid and repairing with spells what the Ran cannot fix by hand. In the mean time he visits other worlds as he has, visiting other nations - taking in refugees who have no other place to go. Two families and what remains of the Drantean people have joined Atlantis, when Harry sits down in the command chair of the patched up Preliator, and closes his eyes.

The ship's bones creek and groan as the Preliator shakes off the sand and fires up the engines. The Preliator is old and still remembers the battle that had brought it down and the haphazard evacuation of it's people, as the smaller ships had fled, leaving only just enough people to land the battle ship on the sand. They had left it there and it had seen them gone, taking with them what they could, what they needed. It wasn't sad, but it was old and lonely, and flying after so long was making it's hull groan.

Harry feels ancient and too young, as he and the Preliator breach through the atmosphere and take in the soothing emptiness of space.

xx

I started writing this basically because I want to turn Atlantis into a booming metropolis. And with Space Haven being so full of wizards, I wanted to try my hand at the whole "Harry alone at Atlantis" thing. Sort of. I just can't seem to let old!Elizabeth die. (This might end up being slash. Not quite sure yet. Won't be het in any case, though.)

In case the back-story was a bit messy - and it might be, in this universe Voldemort hid his Horcruxes all around the world, and one of them was in Antarctica. Harry, Hermione and Ron tried to find it, but the latter two succumbed to the cold. Harry kept at it, and eventually stumbled into the cavern where the Antarctic gate was, and his magic magically turned it on and opened wormhole to Atlantis. Plot holes the sizes of wormholes right here, but I shall not let them bother me. Logic and me have never been best of pals.

My apologies from grammar, timeline and logic errors. Oh, and Happy Newyear!


	2. 51 to 100

**Freefall**

51.

After three weeks in hyper space and two stops at two different planets to contact Atlantis through the local Stargate, the Preliator makes it home, appearing to the space just above the beautiful blue planet that houses the city. By then Harry feels worn and tired and oddly happy in way that doesn't quite touch him - in a way that makes him suspect that what he is sensing is the Preliator's joy for being home.

"We're ready," Irana assures him. His team watches eagerly as he closes his eyes again and then gently takes Preliator down and through the layers of the Lantean atmosphere. Atlantis waits for them, ready and with a landing spot prepared, eager to see one of its lost children home after so long. Preliator's tired voice is joined by the chorus that is Atlantis, and Harry listens to them with weary, distracted mind, as he brings the old ship down to the ever older city and touches down to the pier, making the harmony complete.

52.

That night, the mismatched people of Atlantis celebrate. The Elosians light the pier with lanterns and candles, and the Garoush set tents and tables and chairs, while the Haneen fill the air with music and songs, and the Drantean people join them all, cautious but ready to celebrate something after so long.

"It's something," Harry says, looking at the Preliator, feeling oddly satisfied, oddly proud. The old ship stands upright among the spires like it had always been there - if not for the weathered metal and the signs of battle, one would think it was just another building among many. It feels right - it feels nostalgic.

"It's something," Elizabeth agrees, before Jaran, the Haneen that has been courting her for months, whisks her off to dance.

Harry watches them, humming in dissonance to the songs of the Haneen - in tune with the city and one of it's long lost protectors.

53.

After having spent so long with her while working on the Preliator, Harry isn't all that surprised that Irana makes his team of four into team of five. She still works mostly on the ship as do the rest of the Ran scientists, repairing it and getting it back to it's former glory, but when Harry gets the urge to see a little more, Irana is there, armed and equipped and right at home between assertive Carin and quiet Lian.

"You seem to have a talent of finding new things," she simply says, when he asks her why. "And when you do, you need someone like me to tell you their value." It works pretty well for him.

54.

Neither the addition of the Preliator nor the addition of Irana changes really all that much for Harry and his little team. They still do the same he's been doing since he first stepped out of Atlantis - still make friends, still avoid enemies, still trying to experience something new in every planet. And they still bring something little back, even if it's only wild flowers.

The problem is, things change for the people they know. Some of their allies are happy for them, happy to see them grow stronger. Others are relieved and express the cautious desire that maybe, if things should turn bad on them as well, Atlantis would offer its shelter to them as well. And then there the _others._

55.

What Harry had had with the Genii had been somewhat strained partnership, because he never quite got over the idea that what he saw wasn't all there was to see. After living in a hidden society for seven years, he knew the signs and Genii carried all of them. That was why he rarely took part in their holidays and politely refused their drinks, and was perfectly fair in every trading agreement. All in all, he had been perfectly willing to let Genii keep their secret, whatever it was, so as long as it didn't bother him or his.

It ends, when the Genii hear of the Preliator and decide that the ship would be better off with them. The cells of the underground city are cold and uncomfortable and hold Harry's team only as long as it takes for him to determine how big of a threat the Genii are, how determined they are to live up to that threat.

56.

"I didn't know you could _do_ that!" Irana and Carin gasp together as Harry Apparates his team to the Stargate, staring him widened eyes, fingers reaching their weapons that the Genii had confiscated. Afran and Lian seem shocked too, but they keep quiet, preferring to hold Harry up and check him for injuries left behind by his interrogators.

"I don't usually dare to use it. It's sometimes unreliable, and I don't want to splinch myself," Harry answers through the magical exhaustion, already reaching to dial the gate home, already wondering how to handle Elizabeth's _I told you so_ which he is sure will come the moment they come home.

57.

Elizabeth doesn't exactly say the _I told you so_, but it's in her eyes and in the tight line of her lips. It's also in the security detail of Haneen and Ran she orders to stay in the gateroom at all times, and in the modifications she and the Ran scientists make to the crystal communicators. It's in the way the shield on the gate becomes permanent, until person coming in speaks a code phrase to the communicator, for the voice recognition program at Atlantis to decipher.

It's also in the way she starts saying, "Be safe," every time Harry or anyone leaves Atlantis afterwards.

58.

It takes some explaining to make Irana quiet down after the Apparition. Harry doesn't demonstrate it this time, doesn't dare to do it except in emergencies when his aim and concentration are truest.

"It's easy on my home planet. I _know_ my home planet; I know what it's made of, where it stands in the solar system and in the galaxy, how it moves and how it spins and how the land masses are arranged - I know where I am and where everything else is. I don't know that with other worlds, I don't know that even with Lantea."

Irana theorises that the Apparition is only as secure as his emotional confidence in it is - telling that if he would just believe that he can get it right, he would get it right every time. Harry doesn't quite trust that, because magic is controlled by more than just belief or human beings in general - and because the visions of Ron and Hermione splinching themselves when the cold of the Antarctic became too much for them has never really left him.

59.

Harry hates it a little, how caution and suspicion try and become part of the way he meets other people, how Carin fingers her energy weapon, how Irana and Lian remain nervous until they know more and how Afran never really relaxes. It's not what he wants from the trips off world, not why he started going - though the original reason of being restless isn't really the reason why he has kept at it for so long.

So, he hides the caution and suspicion behind a smile and a warm handshake - or whatever greeting the locals use, himself being fairly fond of the Athosian Meeting of the Minds method. It seems to soothe his slightly rattled sisters and brother in arms, who eventually return to some semblance of what they once were, how they once were… but Harry feels a little like a sneak for doing it.

Suspicion, he fears, has always come too easy for him, and he had really enjoyed the time in Atlantis, when it hadn't seemed necessary.

60.

Suspicion ends up saving the lives of his team, however. On a planet that seems like nothing special, Harry meets a young woman who leans to his shoulder and whispers questions to his ear. Before, he would've taken it as another Pegasus galaxy oddity - or perhaps sorrow, as he has seen the odd individual trying to seduce their way out of the simple, often fear dominated lives of their village homes and into the splendour and security of Atlantis.

But after the Genii, he is suspicious - so suspicious that the touch on his shoulder seems like snake coiling over his skin. He answers her vaguely and obscurely, telling only the truth but leaving majority of it out. His team, with narrowed eyes and tensed shoulders, follow his lead, and offer neither her nor the village leader the chance to see Atlantis in person.

When the Wraith come to try and take them away, they are already half way to the gate and safely out of reach by the time the Darts turn back and try to beam them up.

61.

"We're making too much noise," Elizabeth says softly, after they have heard of the Wraith Worshippers and how a desperate man could give away his whole village for chance of survival. "People are noticing that we're not helpless, that we're not lying down like the rest of the galaxy is. It makes people… greedy."

Harry desperately wishes it wasn't necessary, but there is more at stake than just him or even his team. There are thousand and fourteen people in Atlantis - three hundred and eight of them children, and majority more or less unable to protect themselves from the dangers of the galaxy. He brought them in himself, he promised to protect them, and it is him they now look up.

And thus it is him who has had turn his suspicions to every new refugee that asks for asylum at Atlantis.

62.

"Now will you reconsider having an heir?" Irana and Carin both ask it, even if in different times and different words, after they caught a Genii infiltrator among a group of new refugees - with enough explosives to cause the city some serious damage. After four days of interrogation, the Genii had admitted that his duty had been to plant the explosives in various strategic positions - living quarters and such - and then the Genii would've blackmailed Atlantis in order to gain control of it. It had been enough to spook everyone.

Harry both does and doesn't understand where they come from, his friends when they ask him about possibility of kids. For him people should not bring children into dangerous situations - and Atlantis is becoming the eye of a storm full of them. But for them children are the only legacy they can have, the only way for their people can survive - and the more dangerous it becomes, more important children become. The startling difference of a man who comes from a world populated to the brim, and women from cultures that never reached even two thousand in numbers.

"I'll think about it," Harry finally says, knowing it's time to bend, knowing he can't think like one of six billion anymore - knowing nowadays his return from his off world excursions isn't written in stone.

63.

It still feels like a small betrayal. He doesn't know whom he is betraying, exactly - himself, his parents, his culture, his friends, or maybe Ginny, whose face he can barely remember anymore. He is betraying something, though, because something breaks in him as he hands over his genetic material and little bit of his humanity.

"I _will_ be their father," he demands, leaving no room for arguments, no room of Elosian system in which the men didn't often even know who had fathered what child. "No matter who ends up being the mother."

"Of course," Irana says calmly. "You're the only one who can teach them how to use the power." And though that is not the point, Harry takes it as a small victory.

64.

"Gave finally in, then," Elizabeth muses, nudging his shoulder in odd, almost sibling like compassion. "I know you were against it, but for what it's worth, I think you did the right thing. We need more people like you."

"More wizards, you mean," Harry answers, fingering his wand. Under his power, people felt safe - some still didn't quite believe that he isn't one of their hallowed Ancestors, or on the brink of his personal Ascension. They want more of that - they want to be sure that if he'd be lost, they will still have that in form of his heirs, his children. It feels a little cold to him, to be wanted for his power like that - and very odd, considering the history wizards had with muggles. But he can understand it, in that Pegasus galaxy's desperation way.

"How many volunteers so far?" Elizabeth asks after a moment, sounding a little amused and a little sympathetic.

"About a dozen," Harry sighs, and wonders with mixture of startled pleasure and complete panic, how many children will he have before the year is up.

65.

Of course, there are issues - more than the Ran or anyone else really predict. Harry worries about them constantly, as he gets affirmation that, so far, two women are pregnant with his kids. He worries about accidental magic and schooling, knowing that he can't teach them all he himself knows, knowing that he can't even begin to guess how to start working with things like transfiguration or charms. And then there is the fact that there are no wands for his children - just many, many copies of his wand, which might work for his children but will never be as good as their own chosen ones could have…

And of course, there is every chance that none of his children would have magic at all - though the chances are high, it is still possible that the kids will come out as muggles or squibs. And then what would happen - would his children be shunned for coming out _defective_? Would they fall into obscurity as unnecessary, would they be treated like he had been, like a freak?

What if, what if…

66.

It is an escape, when Elizabeth and Irana both suggest that maybe he'd like to do some off world exploration again, but its escape he welcomes with open arms. Irana steps down from the team in order to attend to the progeny project, and Carin no longer comes with them either - Irana won't allow her, now that she's pregnant. And if that isn't twisted, Harry doesn't know what is - because Carin is his _sister in arms_, and for his Earth-born sensibilities that is just wrong.

But there are other worlds and other cultures, there are ruins and Ancient outposts, there are mysteries and miracles and unseen sceneries and for a while Harry loses himself in them, trying not to think, trying not to worry, and failing at exactly that at every turn. Afran and Lian become his sturdy supports, keeping some semblance of order in his world with their silent, compassionate presence. And if Afran takes into slapping him when ever Harry begins to panic about becoming a father, Harry doesn't rebuke him for it.

67.

Harry tries not to think it too much, but whilst before bringing things back had been something of an amusement for his team - something they did simply because they could, because it was kind - it becomes something more for him. He remembers all the times Elizabeth spoke of weapons, shields, protections… and of dangers. Of ships attacking from the orbit, of assaults by a bombardment, and he is terrified for his unborn sons and daughters - _four_ of them now - like he never was for the rest of the people of Atlantis.

Before he would've been glad of the find he, Afran and Lian make in one abandoned planet where ruins of Ancient outpost still remember the war it lost. Now he is nearly ecstatic, and when the transport of the Ancient drone weapons from the dead outpost to Atlantis begins, he supervises it himself.

68.

"We won't be able to fight a war with these," Elizabeth says, after telling them that four dozen drones wasn't all that much in grand scheme of things - in the Earth Outpost there had been thousands, tens of thousands of them. "But it's a step towards it."

Harry wishes somewhat fervently that she didn't know so much about these things, because it has the tendency of turning a discovery into a disappointment, but he says nothing. Elizabeth plays the devils advocate because she has to - because no one else can. "Then we need to find more," he answers, irritated and tense and worried, and, somewhere deep inside, understanding.

69.

After that it doesn't seem enough though, even if the city has a ZPM capable of powering a shield, even if the city does now has at least some weapons to meet an assault, even if they are seemingly a bit more secure… it doesn't seem enough. Having another ZPM becomes something of a goal for Harry, because having a spare was always a good thing, right? And they could use more of the drones too, that would obviously be a good thing - four dozen was such a little sum. And maybe, if it would be possible, they could have something else, some other weapons, some other protections… another ship like Preliator, maybe, that would make the city safer…

Harry never notices the worried looks his friends give him, as he tries to figure out where the find what he feels the city desperately needs.

70.

"You need to calm yourself," Lian says as she and Afran sit him down, about a month into the pregnancies. "You do no service to yourself or your children - or anyone else - if you keep this up. You need to be calm."

Be calm, be calm, how could he be calm, when he is so far having four - _four!_ - children in a galaxy bent on _eating_ them? The Wraith are still sleeping, but they know about Atlantis and about it's people - about him - and its only matter of time before something happens, something horrible. And there are the Genii who still try to worm their way in and take what Harry has build. And who knew what other dangers were out there, waiting to destroy them - destroy _his_ kids. And Harry's only eighteen, there is only so much he can do, he's not even completely trained -

"Be calm," Lian demands again, slapping him hard across the face, and it's more the shock of having the usually meek healer do something like that than the actual pain that brings Harry out of the panic attack. She looks at him seriously and then smiles, and together with Afran she begins teaching him meditation and breathing exercises.

71.

In the following months, breathing exercises become part of Harry's every day life until finally the idea of having children starts to settle in. His people seem mostly amused by his reaction, but they chalk it off him being young and are only relieved when he finally calms down a little. And if Harry feels resentful for the whole thing and the way people now seem to smile knowingly at him at every turn, it's his business.

72.

"It's been over an year now," Elizabeth says, seemingly out of nowhere, while she and Harry walk along the trading centre that has bloomed into one of the larger halls of Atlantis, with her two ever growing dogs, Amity and Hedge, in tow.

"And we have five more to go, I know. If this is how they all will be, I don't know how I will survive," Harry murmurs in answer, and ignores the amused look she gives in return.

73.

Though Carin no longer comes with them off world she is still part of the team, and once Harry's uneasiness starts giving in, they even feel like that team when ever they are all in Atlantis. Now, though, the team antics include her children more and more, with Harry becoming little Kara's semi-permanent babysitter when ever he is around. Carin, though she doesn't completely understand his determination of about being the _father_ of his children, is nothing if not willing to point out how much practice he needs.

"It doesn't mean that I would ever marry you, however," Carin says, strict and determined, as she teaches him how to change her youngest daughter's nappy.

"If I married every woman carrying my children, I'd have five wives and counting - and one of them is already married," Harry answers a little awkwardly, and tries not to glance at her slightly swollen midsection. It makes him wonder somewhat morosely if he'd ever have a wife at this rate - or if he would ever even want one after this. Considering that he is still somehow a virgin despite what was going on, the odds are against him - or for him, depending on the perspective.

74.

In the end, though, when the panic and fear and endless worry and second guessing is over and done with… Harry finds that he doesn't mind the idea of having children. Even if the concept of how many children the Ran are determined to make him have, it is… not that bad feeling. He was going to have a family.

Though, of course, he already had one. Several, actually. Dursleys didn't really count, but he'd never forget the Weasleys or Hermione - or Sirius for that matter. Then there was his team, whom he no longer wanted to live without, period. And in a way, there was the rest of the Atlantis, with him being the weird way-too-young-father of all several hundred of them.

But still. Flesh and blood family, his very own flesh and blood family… there was _something_ about that.

75.

Sometimes Harry seriously wishes that the Ancients had been a little clearer with their warnings and had left behind some sort of signs. Or that they could've at least locked some doors, made their most dangerous equipment and little harder to get to. Instead you can find something lethal right next to something useless and safe, and nothing to tell which was which. Harry and Elizabeth try and mark rooms dangerous and off limits, try and let people know where they shouldn't go, but it doesn't always work, and every now and then someone gets lost in the wrong place, presses the wrong button, or triggers a wrong mechanism.

Every now and then, someone is lost this way.

A young couple looking for privacy release a strange energy creature that ends up killing them and almost many others, before a brave a Ran scientist manages to lure it back to its trap and lock it inside. The communications system suffers a glitch after wrong code and the noise very nearly drives everyone in Atlantis deaf and then dead before Elizabeth manages to shut it down - they lose a sensitive Drantean infant in the incident. A purifying gas meant to detoxify the city ends up killing the hapless boy who released it and then almost everyone else as well, before Irana manages to vent the city.

The people of Atlantis learn not to touch strange things very quickly.

76.

The Haneen funeral ceremony becomes the norm within the city due to the fact that among all the ceremonies known to the people of Atlantis, the Haneen ones tend to be the most basic and yet most elaborate - and more often than not, the most meaningful. It takes some time for the Ran and the Dranteans to learn to understand the concept of Death as a dear friend - as someone who visits everyone, telling stories while ringing a bell and burning incense - but they accept it for what it is. A symbol.

With each dead, the chosen Death changes, never being the same person more than once. Harry watches a young girl, an old man, a middle aged warrior, a little boy, and many others wear the white robes and carry the bell and the incense, and feels oddly comforted by Death's many faces.

77.

When Eriana, a Garoush woman carrying one of Harry's unborn children, suffers a miscarriage, no one listens to Harry when he says that it doesn't require a funeral ceremony. The unborn infant gets a solemn burial at sea, and the empty casket, that would've held the boy had there been enough of him to hold, is lost beneath the waves of the Lantean ocean while nearly everyone in Atlantis watches and sings farewell hymns. Later, a little boy in white robes - black haired and dark eyed and no doubt what people thought Harry's unborn child would've looked like - comes to Harry, telling him of death and of life and how it is all part of the circle, and Harry doesn't know what to feel.

In the dead of the night, he names his dead unborn son James and knows he will never tell it to anyone.

78.

When the people of Iargos contact Harry through one of his off world friends, they are a beaten, tired and starved people. A year ago the Iargosians were a thriving civilisation of almost hundred thousand, with great cities and even greater industrial section, with weapons and even space ships. The Wraith had left them alone for nearly one thousand years, and for a long while the Iargosians had thought that the Wraith did not know about them or simply did not care about them, and that by the time they would, Iargos would be technologically advanced enough to fight back.

They had thought wrong. Harry listens them quietly as they tell how the Wraith came in small numbers to pick them to pieces. Their defeat had been slow and torturous, lasting for months as one by one their towns and cities fell, their ships proved out to be useless, their strength batted aside by the Wraith like it had been nothing. "Like it was a game," they say, horrified and distraught and helpless against it all.

Only some hundreds of the hundred thousand of Iargosians still survive - those who were in different worlds and those who were evacuated when the helpless, hopeless war had begun. Mostly scholars, scientists and children, the best and brightest of their people - who have no idea how to survive without their people's support, who have so far survived on stubbornness and desperation.

His sympathy doesn't stop Harry from performing various security checks, before allowing the Iargosians to join the mixed races of Atlantis.

79.

"I think I'm almost used to the idea that you're really going to turn Atlantis into a thriving metropolis," Elizabeth says, as the Lanteans welcome their new Iargosian brothers into their midst.

"Would it really be better if it was empty?" Harry asks. He still remembers how hollow the city had felt, how cold. How sad her songs had been. So different.

"I suppose not," Elizabeth answers. Harry knows she still sometimes wishes it actually was - that she could hand it over like a gift to her expedition, to give them the magnificent start that she herself had gone for. Now she doesn't know if that will happen - and if her expedition comes through, what would follow.

But then, no one really does.

80.

Harry leads his team and two dozen of Iargosians back to their ruined home planet in quiet salvaging mission. Trying to ignore the looks of pain and longing in the faces of his new protégés, Harry commands them to gather what they need, what they can fix, and carry it back to the gate. It's something he hasn't been able to give to most of his people - what remained of their homes was often too ruined for salvage.

As it is, the Iargosians can't find much, not in comparison to what they _had_, but what they find makes some difference when they carry what remains of their libraries and their museums and art galleries. Later Harry knows another mission would salvage weapons and maybe even some of the fighter ships they deemed still repairable, but he is glad that their priority is their culture, not their destructive might.

81.

Like every other race, the Iargosians bring in something new with them to Atlantis - something which Harry and Elizabeth both agree isn't a bad addition. Though the libraries and the art are appreciated - the Iargosians have some magnificent paintings - it's the theatre and the interpretive story telling that has the rest of Atlantis buzzing with excitement. It's something extremely common for the Iargosians - everyone knew how to act because it was used as a learning tool in Iargos, with kids playing parts of the adults, the soldiers and scientists and professionals they would one day learn to be.

In Atlantis they quickly device new plays, taking what they saw their fellow Lanteans do and integrating it all to their acts, acting the parts of warriors and botanists and making stages with consoles and crystals and acting out scenes completely in the Ancient language. And though for them it is a way to internalise a new lifestyle and learn new skills, for the rest of the Lanteans watching them is light hearted entertainment they had never known they had been missing.

Since the Iargosians learned most from the critique of their audiences, they only welcomed the enthusiasm.

82.

The Genii don't show themselves before it is too late to stop them. They are already in the city, having slipped in under the guises of traders. Then they are there, holding Harry's people at gunpoint, holding Atlantis captive with hidden explosives and cutting threats. Their leader, Kolya, stands in front of Harry while aiming his gun steadily at Carin's forehead, demanding him to hand the city over - demanding he makes city wide announcement for his surrender. At his sides, other Genii soldiers hold Elizabeth and Jaran, Afran and Lian, and everyone else - with no less than four guns at Harry himself.

They had done their infiltration well, extremely well. But they had also done a mistake. "Did you know; the woman you're holding at gunpoint is carrying my child?" Harry asks as deathly calm falls over him.

Kolya, by the looks of him, thinks it's an advantage. "All the more reason for you to comply," he says, smug and confident and almost satisfied. Thinking he can control Harry by threatening Carin. Thinking he has the upper hand.

Not realising that _he is threatening the life Harry's child_.

83.

Harry has never told anyone about the Imperius curse, not his people, not even Elizabeth. That's why Kolya doesn't know to avoid it when it comes, silent and invisible and all too easily cast while Harry pretends to lower his wand to the floor along with the rest of his weapons. But cast it is and though no one notices when Kolya's commands shift, still remaining recognizable as _his_ commands, they do shift to follow Harry's agenda, allowing the wizard easily hit the rest of the Genii. No one sees it coming.

"Guardian?" Harry's people ask in wonder, in _horror_, as the subjugated Genii head off to capture or kill the rest of their comrades hidden among the people of Atlantis. Harry says nothing, just waits alertly until the Genii are all under control, before commanding them to seek out every explosive they had planted and bring them back with them. Then, with unforgiving eyes, he watches until they are all out of his city along with the danger they brought in. On the other side, they would plant their explosives into their own city, with irreversible results.

"They'll learn not to try that again," Harry simply says, steel and ice and strength he didn't know he had - wished he hadn't discovered.

84.

One day, Harry will feel sorry, but not the way he thinks he will. He will look back and regret the direction he chose, the course he set. He will regret the looks he will one day get, when people whisper behind his back and murmur warnings and cautious and respects to new allies and friends. _That's him, the Guardian,_ they will say. _Do you know what he is capable of?_ They will ask, gloating, warning. _Have you heard about the Genii - about what the Guardian did to them?_

Harry will regret that - and that somewhere, beneath the veneer of casualness and compassion, the caution will always stay. He will regret the looks of admiration and confidence he gets - the trust people place on him, knowing that he can make the gruesome decision when it comes to it. He will regret that one day his children will hear about it too, and that they will lift their chins and be proud - and never truly understand. Most of all he will regret the steel that sinks into his spine - it will cut him in the night and twist painfully in the quiet hours in the morning and never again let him truly relax.

He won't regret what he did, though.

He can't allow himself to.

85.

All in all, the invasion ends up being quick, almost quiet affair - in total, the Genii only stay in Atlantis for about a day, most of that spend under cover and with everyone being blissfully oblivious. When they are gone, it is as if they had never been there at all, as they leave no mark but a memory in the hearts of those who had been held at gunpoint. Majority of Atlantis doesn't even know they had been there before they are long gone.

But the fallout from the incident lasts for weeks. It's in the eyes of those who saw Harry silently control the Genii - it's in the way Carin cannot look him in the eyes at all. It's in the stories that spread across the city like a wild fire - and then it's in the faces of everyone. It's in the stories they hear off world - of the devastation that struck the Genii. It's in the vigilance that suddenly comes over their off world allies - especially those of suspicious allegiances.

It's in the way Elizabeth looks at him, swallows, lifts her chin a little higher and looks oddly defeated in her defiance.

86.

In the week or so it takes for the people of Atlantis to relax after the incident, Harry tries to make himself as scarce as possible, trying not to be so present. He goes off world - with only Afran as his company because Lian can't look at him anymore - and he stays over night, sometimes with allies, sometimes in empty worlds with only his ever vigilant _Haran_ as his company. Afran says to him only once that he did the right thing. He doesn't even try to deny how much it frightened people that he had been able to actually do it, though.

Eventually the city returns to normal and tensed shoulders loosen up. But changes have been made. The four women bearing Harry's children all now have Haneen guards, _Haran_ guards even, who would one day be the watchers and bodyguards of his children. There are now new security measures for travellers and those coming into the city - there are new sensors in the gate room, looking for hidden weapons, logging every visitor down. And that's just the beginning.

When Harry dares to stay at the city long enough to listen to the rumours, he hears people refer to Elizabeth as the Watcher - because Atlantis now recognises only one Guardian.

87.

"It's alright," Elizabeth assures him when he carefully approaches her about it. "It was only the matter of time. In a way I am relieved - it was a struggle to define my authority before, and even more of a struggle to make people to recognise it. But now that I have been given a new title, it… eases the strain somewhat."

It doesn't change the fact that now, if it was Harry's word against hers, Harry would be right in the eyes of Atlantis. "For what it's worth, you still will be running this place more than I will be. You're better at it," he more offers than states.

"Hm, maybe," she agrees, and though the smile doesn't quite reach her eyes, it's a start.

88.

Eventually Lian and Carin relax too, and one night Carin and her older children confront him, thank him and together concede that, "Maybe its better that you're the father of this child," which is almost as good as open invitation. To what, Harry doesn't know, but he's glad nonetheless.

Lian on other hand personally patches Harry up after a disastrous venture off world, and tells him that she'll be joining his mad ventures because apparently he couldn't keep himself in one piece. Harry secretly thinks she has been spending too much time with Carin and Afran - possibly Irana too - but he's too glad to have her not flinching at his presence to say anything.

89.

The ventures off world stop feeling like attempt to escape too, after a while, and return to what they were before Genii - almost to what they were before the progeny project. Harry is almost back to the mindset of exploration rather than breaking free, and he faces new people and old friends with semblance of his former cheer. Afran follows suit, never having truly changed his attitude, and so does Lian, and if she still winces slightly when ever he pulls his wand, he doesn't blame her for it.

90.

On a planet where the sunsets were oddly purple and water seemed to shine in the dark under the light of the galaxy, Harry takes a sip of a yellow drink offered to him, and spends the rest of the night in love with the high priestess who tries to seduce him into staying at the village, at the temple. And at the time it seems like the perfect idea, despite the voice in the back of his head, screaming.

Harry almost ends up cursing Lian when she tries to persuade him away from the priestess, before Afran knocks him out. When he wakes up back in Atlantis, with the potion safely out of his system, he appreciates his sister and brother more than he can quite put into words. He spends the rest of the day apologising to Lian for almost attacking her - when she's still shaken after the Genii, too - until she tells him to shut up and almost force-feeds him a sleeping potion when he doesn't.

91.

The Ferantans are so ashamed of the actions of their high priestess - who had apparently been only recently appointed - that they very nearly sell her to Harry as a slave. Only in "peace negotiations" that follow the "unfortunate incident" does Harry find out that the Ferantans were having some serious problems with their crop and that they were desperately looking for trade partners to replace the diseased grain.

Though Harry could've pointed several of his off-world friends to them, people who he knew were looking for new trading partners, he doesn't, not after finding out about how much drugs played part in the Feranta society - love potions being the least of their delights. But he cannot ignore their pleads with good conscience, so he sets up a meeting in a different world, ending up as the negotiator not only for that trade agreement, but something far greater.

92.

After the incident with the Genii, all trading had stopped in Atlantis. Harry hadn't ordered it, but no one had argued, and so all trade actions happened off world now, with the Lanteans taking what they offered out and brining what they gained in. It is safer, according to Elizabeth and many others, but it is also very inconvenient. So, when Harry intercedes the trade between the Ferantans and the Olatains, it starts something.

It takes Elizabeth only couple of days to find the perfect planet for it - uninhabited and somewhat difficult to live in, as the planet surface was too hot and somewhat toxic. The planet did, however, have elaborate cave systems where the Ancients had once had an outpost, studying the special geography of the caves which had allowed complicated plant life to bloom in the cave ceilings - plant life which handily enough supplied both oxygen and light for the caves.

Harry watches with amazement, as Elizabeth marshals the Lanteans and several of their off world allies into establishing an off-world trading hub in the planet's vast caves.

93.

"We will be doing bit of remodelling, of course," Elizabeth says, as they explore the caves and got things ready. "Thankfully, the outpost here is perfectly intact, so we can use that as a sort of governing building. And the outpost has the control of the gate, along with its shield, so that's good. There has been some damage over the last thousand years though, tunnels collapsing and what not. For those, we will use these."

Harry has always known that the ancient science was greater than wizard magic - but the lines between the two have never blurred as much as they do, when Elizabeth slams a crystal cube into rubble of stone, and instantly transforms it into smooth, almost beautiful crystal corridor. She explains that the Tok'ra used similar crystals back in Milky Way - and that she wasn't surprised that they had gotten the technology from the ancients. Harry is too amazed to say anything.

94.

The trading hub doesn't immediately take in - and when it does, it almost accidentally turns into a refugee camp, when people take it as a safe place to stay. People get the right idea soon enough, though, and tentatively first traders meet in the caverns, and start setting up tables and chairs and then stalls where they can talk business.

It also becomes a sort of Beta Site for Atlantis, as Elizabeth calls it. Handful of Lanteans take semi-permanent residence in the Ancient outpost there, mostly Ran and Iargosians, but some Dranteans and Garoush along with contingent of Haneen warriors - though they all seem the same to Harry now. They set up rules and regulations and arrange security measures and watches, and cement the idea that Atlantis was in charge of the Trading Centre.

And underneath it all, Harry finds odd solace in knowing that if Atlantis would ever have to evacuate, they would have a place to go.

95.

Still, the idea of the Trading Centre as place for refugees doesn't quite die out, and people come in and out, and as the place grows they even get some beggars to Harry's mild surprise and grief. But he leaves the place and its management to Ijar and Eora, Haneen warrior and Ran diplomat whom they had put in charge of the place, knowing that they knew how to do their jobs.

Still, when ever larger group of people come, asking for sanctuary, it's Harry who meets them. Though they usually are refugees running from Wraith, sometimes they are just victims of misfortune or other people - or sometimes just rejects of their societies, for reason or another. Harry hears them all out, offers places to stay for some and places to go to for others - and sometimes, more often than he would've liked to, he shows them the door.

The Satedans, when the come, are a whole new thing, though.

96.

"We do not want your _pity_!" the leader of the Satedans, Standing Chieftain Seter, almost snarls to Harry when the talks begin. "We have no interest in living upon charity!"

It's hard to remain patient with the man, who is obviously a proud warrior and very protective of his people's honour, when around them there are wounded women and children and young men who had lost limbs in the war their planet had fought and lost to the Wraith little ago. Their tale is similar to the one of the Iargosians, making Harry wonder if the same Wraith was behind it, but in the end he didn't care as much about that as he did of the well being of these wounded, beaten people.

Getting a word through when the man was ranting about honour and pride and ignoring his people's obvious pain was hard, though.

"Though charity is what grants entrance to Atlantis, no one lives upon it," Lian is the one to soothe Standing Chieftain's ruffled feathers, speaking the unspoken rule Harry had never thought about, but which he knew governed Atlantis more than he or Elizabeth did. "Everybody is required to learn, adapt and one day contribute to the general wellbeing of the whole."

97.

The Satedans at first want nothing to do with Atlantis - they want to make their own way, and only wish to trade for information. Seter is confident that his people would manage the best if they could find a new planet and simply start over - he is willing to hand over Satedan technology for the information. It is not, however, a belief shared by the others - nor by Harry, who has seen enough wounded and beaten to know that the Satedan survivors are in no shape to rebuild. They aren't even healed - some of them haven't even stopped bleeding yet.

"I will see if we can provide you with a planet to start over in," he says. "However, all Satedans are welcome to Atlantis," he adds, looking not at Seter but at the others, the women and the old men. "We will provide for you until you can pay us back."

It's an offer which, despite Seter's attempts to keep the survivors together, Harry knows many of them will take.

98.

It has become customary for the Lanteans to throw a party when ever people joined them - the more people, the bigger the party. With Satedans it's no different - especially after they learn that Satedan manner of mourning the dead is live as loudly and wildly as possible. It very nearly drives the healers of Atlantis up the wall when the still wounded Satedans try and get as drunk as possible, but they can do little to stop it. Even wounded, most of the Satedans are warriors rivalling, or perhaps surpassing the Haneen.

"Well, we can always use a little bit more military," Elizabeth says as they watch the party from a safe distance, and Harry can't quite tell if she's kidding or not.

99.

A hush of sorts falls over Atlantis when Irana and Kiran announce that Leean, an Elosian woman who had been first to become pregnant with Harry's child, was approaching her time. Anticipation fills the air and people begin to whisper excitedly - much to the confusion of the newer additions to the city who aren't so invested in their new governor lineage. Harry finds himself being the receiver of congratulating pats and nods and smiles, as if his child was already born, and starts to fall into old habits of panicking more and more with every day and every hour.

When Leean finally goes into labour in middle of one night, Harry blames the late hour for the weakness that makes his knees give out.

100.

The child is a boy. That's all Harry hears of what the healer says before handing the boy to him, red faced and wrinkly and still _wet_. He's a boy and he's screaming and wringing impossibly tiny, impossibly fragile hands at Harry - and Harry can't quite get over the fact that at age of eighteen _he has a son_. The healer has to cut the umbilical chord while Harry still holds the boy, because his hands seem to seize up around the child, trying to avoid moving too much for the fear of causing harm.

Couple of days later when the child is stronger and whole lot cleaner - and Harry has recovered from several mild panic attacks - the Guardian of Atlantis takes his son to the city and shows him to his people. "My first born," he says, soft but loud enough for everyone to hear. "Sirius."

All previous parties that had taken place Atlantis pale in the comparison to the one that follows.

xx

I've decided not to make this about pairings, slash or otherwise - it seems better kept as it is. I shall fulfil my secret fantasies of Harry x Rodney elsewhere. Thanks to Cocoagirl3 for the idea for the trading centre, I hope you don't mind me borrowing it. Also, there was a anonymous and nameless reviewer who came up with a better back story than I did - if I weren't so lazy and if it didn't screw a little bit with the timing, I would change the story and use that. I might use other ideas from other reviews though, if they fit the story. I do have a question for those good at coming up with these types of snippet ideas. Any thoughts for strange but semi-functional Ancient Tech? I'm running into a corner with that. No factories though, I have one already planned. Also, ideas for alien races, human, alien, friendly, nonfriendly or otherwise, could maybe come in handy. I have several thought out, but the more the merrier.

Oh, and also, in my headcanon the Asurans or the Ori don't exist, so we won't be encountering them. Sorry about that. Edit: And neither does anything involved with Stargate Universe.

My apologies for possible grammar errors.


	3. 101 to 150

**Freefall**

101.

The speciality of having a kid, a little baby boy with a tuff of what one day will be black hair and bright bright green eyes, doesn't fade for days, for weeks - probably not for years, if what Harry feels is really as strong as his reeling mind seems to think it is. He hangs around the infirmary wing and watches his son as Sirius grows stronger, and marvels. He's there, still marvelling, when Kiran announces that Sirius is strong enough to go home, and carries Sirius away himself - away and to Leean's apartment. There he makes himself something of a nuisance with his staring and just being present while Leean's two daughters and one son stare at him and as just as fascinated by him as he is by Sirius.

Thankfully Leean, or Afran who follows with somewhat suffering look about his face, or Kharan, Leean's and Sirius's _Haran_, do not seem to mind seeing their Guardian act like a lost puppy. They indulge his fascination with absent smiles and indulgent sighs, exchanging looks over his head but not bothering him as he reaches down to Sirius' crib and barely manages to stifle a disbelieving laugh about how small Sirius's fingers are.

102.

He knows that he will have other children - more of them than he ever though possible. He has heard Irana mention the nice round ten - just to begin with - too many times to not know that the four he's having now, in addition to Sirius, wouldn't be it. And he knows that he can't be there for them all the time; he has too many duties and his urge to see other worlds is too great - that was why the mothers would be raising his children, they had the time and they knew how it was done, that was why they had been selected.

It doesn't stop him from visiting Leean and Sirius as often and possible, muttering nonsense to his son as he changes his nappy or washes him before bed - nor vowing to do the same with his other children, as often as it's just possible.

103.

Though he named Sirius the moment he was born - the instant he knew his gender even - there is a naming ceremony. It is a mixture of Haneen with little bit of Elosian and some Drantean with the Ran locator chip implantation ceremony thrown in because of security. Almost everyone on Atlantis gathers in the peer for it, and Harry finds himself in the odd position of conducting the ceremony while being a participant in it carrying his child and naming his child at the same time.

Sirius wears the Haneen black gown - so different from way it is on earth, because here black means strength and stealth and survival, and white means peace of the long sleep. Sirius also has the Drantean Infancy Ribbons around his wrists and ankles, which whish this way and that way as he moves. While the Elosian women sing the quiet hymn of new life, the Dranteans nod with satisfaction - the ribbons were moving nicely, it is good luck. And while Sirius moves, urged by all to make as much noise as possible because noise meant health and strength, Harry tells them stories of the man he was named after, and the man he hopes Sirius will be.

"Strong man, honourable man - and one day, the guardian of his younger brothers and sisters," Harry says and thus, half accidentally and half intentionally, names Sirius his heir and successor.

104.

But he still has his duties, and week after Sirius was born, he is back in the trading centre, negotiating a treaty between the Olatains and new trading partners named Yveranas. While there he listens to rumours and accepts congratulations for his first child, and worries about the news that come from across the galaxy. He hears of a Wraith war lord that, unlike rest of his race, doesn't sleep and who had now shown interest in the trading partners of Atlantis - and Atlantis itself.

105.

"Sateda has always had stories of the warlord," Ternok, one of the Satedan survivors who now moves around in a wheeled chair the Ran and the Iargosian scientists made for him, tells Harry. "He's been a figure in the stories we told over camp fires and to our children - the Wraith who lets you get over confident and then takes pleasure in destroying you when you think you're the strongest. It was a life lesson - reminder that you can never be too strong or too fast, you can never stop improving."

Harry nods absently - the Iargosians have similar stories, though theirs are faded into myths because theirs was more peaceful society. Still, he can see it - the pattern - and as Irana connects the dots on a star map, Iargos, Sateda and other planets with similar histories, the picture becomes clear.

106.

"We already knew that Wraith had certain areas," Garoe, a Ran historian, explains to Harry, Elizabeth and the various spokes persons of the assorted people of Atlantis. He points to a crystal screen, to a star map, pointing out planets and drawing territories. "For example, the original home of the Ran, First Ranor, was in the territory of what we called at the time the Blue Wraith Tribe, while Second and Third Ranor were in the territory of the Skeleton Tribe. We thought at the time that Fourth Ranor was in neutral zone between the two territories - before the Blue Tribe attacked us."

"And so you think that this warlord that isn't sleeping, that he's in charge of the area with Iargos and Sateda in it?" Harry asks, thoughtful.

"Along with Venna, Estera and possibly also Holden, judging by the local folklore," Garoe nods, bringing another star map to the screen, drawing another territory bubble in to it. The bubble, however, doesn't only compass the five planets - but nearly ten others.

"Fifteen planets, being toyed and culled by a Wraith tribe that isn't sleeping," Elizabeth murmurs, looking ill.

"No," Irana disagrees with a glint in her eyes. "Fifteen planets, some of which are possibly in relatively high stages of technological and sociological development - much higher than probably anywhere else in the galaxy."

107.

The first planet of the warlords territory they visit that they don't already know, is called Ashara - and visiting it turns out to be mistake. The people are wild, easily agitated and they wear more weapons than clothes - and, disagreeing with Irana's calculations, they aren't any more advanced than majority of the galaxy - unless one counts spear throwing.

Afran takes one of those spears to his side on their hurried way back to the spaceship. Under protest he lets his brother Ihar take over his duties as Harry's _Haran_, swearing that he'd be back in his post before two weeks would be over, rather than the two months of rest Kiran prescribes him.

108.

The second planet is either empty, or the people are hidden so well that even the Lantean life sensors can't find them - and considering that the planet is completely without any plant life exact for some stone-like cacti and no water to speak off, Harry decides not to try and find out.

109.

The third and fourth planets turn out to be similar to the first one - the people are warrior like and wild. In the fourth planet, however, the people aren't that adverse to other humans, so Harry, Lian, Irana and Ihar get the chance to learn the reason for their fairly hostile lifestyle.

"The Wraith come here twice a week - always a group of five," the leader of the Ghenar village explains to them, fingering his impressive battle axe as he does. "We fight - and if we win, we don't die."

Ihar demands that they leave before the Wraith return, but Irana insists leaving one of the Ancient versions of video cameras behind so that they can later examine the footage and figure out what the Wraith were doing. When, a week later, the Ghenar return the camera to them, Irana's statement is bleak. "I believe they use some of these planets as training facilities of sorts - teaching their soldiers to fight."

"Well, not we know they _need_ training, at least," Harry muses, not sure why it was important but knowing it was.

110.

It isn't until the sixth planet they, in a manner of speaking, hit the jackpot. Kinhar is a dry, rocky planet full of canyons and deserts, where the people live in stone fortresses inside the various deep ravines - and according to Ihar, their defence against Wraith Darts is perfect. Like in Sateda, Ashara and Ghenar the people are fairly warrior like, but in completely different way. Their swords and spears shine with angry white energy - their shields, when activated, glow see through and cover incredible areas.

"Kinhar used to be lively and lush," Knight Commander Kreiak explains to Harry and his team while giving them a tour in his fortress. "That was before the war against the Wraith, four hundred years ago. When the forests of Anther burned, it started a chain reaction that eventually turned our entire continent into nothing but a desert. We have learned to adapt since then."

111.

The Kinharians are like the Ran in manner of speaking - they had held onto their sciences and technologies when their lifestyle had been destroyed. But theirs had adapted into different forms - they have no blasters but energy blades, they have no city-wide shields and instead theirs are actual _shields_ they carry with them everywhere, they live in forts made of stone but have sensor grid that covers the entire planet and warns them when the Wraith come. For Harry, they are like medieval society - but with Star Wars lightsabers.

What makes the greatest impact with Harry and his team, however, isn't their odd mixture of old and new, but their medicine. Though their drugs and medicine aren't that advanced, their prosthetics are incredible - the Knight Commander himself walks on mechanical feet, and he isn't even nearly the only one, almost everyone have mechanised limbs - most also have metal chest plates that have actually attached to their skeletal structure.

"We do all we can to make it a little harder for the Wraith to defeat us," the Knight Commander says with proud tilt of his skin. It's awe striking - and a little disturbing, especially when Harry realises that most people with mechanical limbs happily amputated their healthy arms and legs for no other reason, than to become a little bit stronger, little bit faster.

112.

Like all other planets in the Wraith warlord's territory, Kinhar also has a space gate, and not a normal one - "It's to stop people from escaping, I think," Irana explains with a frown. The Kinharians are aware of theirs, so when Harry proposes an alliance - explaining them about the gate and Atlantis and what they might be able to do for each other - they aren't surprised. They are, however, even prouder than the Satedans - even if completely different way.

"You have seen our strength and you wish to add us to your armies?" the Knight Commander asks thoughtfully, eying Harry up and down, assessing. "You wish for us to swear fealty to you. You must understand that it is not as simple as something you merely talk over dinner. Our people aren't swayed by words alone."

"No, I was actually thinking more along the lines of trade agreements and perhaps lending assistance to each other if it's needed," Harry answers - he's more interested in the prosthetic technology and what it could do to the many Satedans back in Atlantis who would otherwise never walk or fight again.

He realises a little too late that the Kinharians don't do alliances - and they don't really do talks, either.

113.

Harry is wearing armour, and holding onto energy shield and laser sword before he has the chance to explain that he's not really a fighter. The Kinharians don't listen, not to him nor his people and the easy manner in which they chain Ihar down to stop him from interfering speaks volumes of their strength - in body and conviction. Harry barely manages to get a word through, before he's standing in a stone stadium, with the Knight Commander Kreiak standing in front of him, in full battle armour.

"Now what?" Harry asks, though he has a bad feeling he already knows.

"Now we fight to the death or defeat - and if you win, my fort and its warriors will swear fealty to you, as will I," Kreiak answers, swinging his broadsword, which leaves angry red lines of energy to the air in its wake. "Prepare yourself."

114.

Harry almost loses - not just the fight, but his various limbs and his head when Kreiak swings his sword at him. The fight is completely one sided, and Harry feels clumsy and slow in the heavy armour he has no idea how to carry and which only hinders his movements. Only the energy shield keeps him alive, but with each impact of Kreiak's sword, it shines a little less, as it power source begins to run dry. The fight is completely hopeless.

Then, groaning with irritation, bruised and singed and feeling like an idiot, Harry throws his sword and shield away, jumps back to hurriedly undress the heavy armour. Kreiak watches him silently as he takes a stand, bare footed and handed and only wearing tunic and trousers, and for a moment looks like he's about to call the fight ended. He doesn't get the chance, because Harry moves forward, and begins the fight anew.

Harry hasn't been training with Afran and the other Haneen for months for nothing, after all.

A shield and a broadsword aren't a good defence for the fast paced nimble _Her-taan_ style which is designed to get close quarters in way Kreiak isn't adjusted to - but then, _Her-taan_ wasn't style wasn't that effective against bladed weapons. Harry breaks Kreiak's nose and almost dislocates his jaw - and loses his left leg in the process of winning.

115.

"It's a good sign!" Kreiak booms happily when he's regained consciousness and Harry is on the verge of losing his, while the Kinharians and Lian are tending to what remains of his left leg. "It's an omen! An unarmed fighter taking down a Knight such as I, winning despite the loss of limb! A great omen!"

None of Harry's team seem to agree and Ihar looks like he's on a verge of attacking Kreiak, but Harry doesn't care - the drugs are kicking in and everything is going blurry and he barely manages to agree to a surgery before he quite gladly passes out.

116.

Harry is still reeling from losing a _limb_ and the fact that, while he was unconscious, it had been replaced with a robotic one - which for now works on automated programs until his nerves would adjust to it - when the Kinharians kneel before him and one by one swear their oaths to him. They ceremonially hand their weapons to him and somewhat tiredly he hands them back, accepting the oaths while Ihar growls in anger behind him and Irana fiddles with his new, heavy leg.

In the end, he becomes the virtual owner of Kreiak's entire fort, which includes two hundred knights, half a thousand of civilians, and boat load of troubles he doesn't know if he'd be able to handle. But at least it's just one fort and not all of them - there are hundreds of them all around Kinhar - and seven hundred people are not a bad addition to Atlantis. Because in the end, near loss of life and literal loss of limb aside, he knows the facts - Atlantis can _definitely_ use a few warriors like the Kinharians.

117.

It doesn't stop him from locking himself up in his room for some privacy once he gets back to Atlantis, and mourning the loss of his leg with gritted teeth and trembling fingers. It hasn't settled in - he doubts it will for months - and even though the metal is real and cold and _hard_ under his fingers, he can't believe it. It feels like a joke, like an illusion - like his own leg was _just there_ and would be back any moment. Shivering and trying to get grips with reality, he wonders what happened to his actual leg, what had been done with it after it had gotten cut off. He hadn't seen it Kinhar - and he hadn't dared to ask at the time.

He's on the verge of breaking down when Leean comes to him with Sirius in her arms and Kharan shadowing her, and gives him something else, something _better_, to concentrate on.

118.

While Harry calms down - he has to because Leean won't take Sirius from him until he does, and before he does Sirius won't stop crying - Afran escapes the care ward and comes to him. Leean stands in the side, looking puzzled, while the _Haran_ apologises and blames himself and swears oaths that make the Kinhar ones seem light in comparison, telling that it was his fault, that it would never happen again, that he'd die before it happened again. That he'd give his own leg to his Guardian if he only could.

Oddly enough, explaining Afran how it was definitely not his fault makes Harry feel a little better - and so does being forced to call security to take Afran back to bed because the pale, wounded, _proud_ man wouldn't budge from his feet otherwise.

119.

"You inspire lot of loyalty," Leean says, once Sirius is finally asleep and Harry feels like he's whole again. "I can't always see why, but somehow you do. I'd keep that in mind the next time you decide to fight to the death with someone."

"I guess saying that I didn't really agree to it wouldn't mean much," Harry answers.

"Hm. No. But that's because if they would've asked, you probably _would've agreed_," the woman snorts. "Get your act together, Guardian. Sirius - and your other children - need their father."

120.

Because the Kinhar gate is in space, and because the smaller cylinder ships can only ferry so many people, Harry and Elizabeth decide that the Kinharians would need to be transported on the Preliator. "Are you up to it?" Elizabeth asks, glancing down to the mechanical foot that peeks out from underneath Harry's robes, and to the crutches Harry is forced to use for balance. The foot, Harry suspects, is the only reason she hasn't said much against the addition of Kinharians to the city.

"I think I can manage sitting in a chair," he answers. "I'm not as worried about that as I am of the fact that Kinhar is smack in middle of the territory of an active Wraith tribe."

She grimaces slightly, but says nothing more - though Harry can see it in her face, her wish for alternatives. But there aren't any - ferrying people on small ship would take too long and though the trip of Kinhar would take two weeks, it was much less likely that the Wraith would notice one big ship coming and going once, rather than days of continuous gate activations.

121.

On the second week on route, while Preliator stops at empty planet to check up on Atlantis, Harry gets news that make him _really_ wish that there was someone else who could fly the ancient ships and not just him. One of the mothers, Tair who was a Ran, had gone into early labour and Kiran and Elizabeth are happy to inform that he now has a healthy daughter, though small and still under observation just to be sure.

"Congratulations," Irana says to him, as they listen to the wails of his first daughter over the communications system. "What are you going to name her?"

"Lily," Harry says, closing his eyes and basking in the sound of his family growing in numbers.

122.

In Kinhar the people are ready and packed and when Harry lands the Preliator beside their fort, they immediately begin the transfer of their goods on board. They are fast and trained and the lines hold as boxes and bags and crates go from hand to hand and finally to the ship, but it still takes longer than Harry likes.

Preliator informs him of approaching Wraith hive ship in the middle of the transfer of goods - and while Harry is trying to figure out whether he should make the Kinharians abandon their stuff, the space gate activates and Dart's spew out in alarming rate. Harry would've panicked then, probably done something stupid and gotten people killed, if Preliator hadn't been still in contact with his mind - and in possession of much more experience and patience.

_'Shield, expand,'_ the old ship suggests, and Harry hurriedly agrees, feeling more than seeing how the war ship's shield activates and then expands to cover the supply line and the fortress, securing the people against the Wraith culling beams and weapons. _'Weapons, fire,'_ Preliator suggests again, and again Harry agrees - and then feels and watches and _directs_ the golden drones as they shoot up and towards the Wraith, circling when they missed and following until they finally hit a target.

_'Evacuation, commence,'_ Preliator suggests again, and feeling oddly like he's the ship and Preliator the wizard sitting in the command chair, Harry quickly issues the orders.

123.

The first space fight Harry takes part in ends up being short and somewhat dishonourable, according to Kreiak. The hive ship waits for them in the orbit when Harry brings the Ancient warship up, and launches an attack the moment they're clear of the atmosphere. Neither Harry nor Preliator have any intention of getting into a fight - Preliator still isn't up to hundred percent, and the shield's are already wavering. So, they launch an evasive manoeuvre they device on the spot and fake a battle attempt before making their escape into hyperspace while the Hive launched Darts.

"This is disgraceful. You should have fought, and not escaped like a coward," Kreiak says with a thoughtful expression.

"And courageously lost the fight, the ship and all seven hundred people on board?" Harry asks cuttingly. "You're under the impression that I am a knight like you, Kreiak - but I'm not. I'm the Guardian of my people and my people's survival is _always_ my priority. Not their honour or dishonour."

He doesn't know how someone can be exasperated and humbled by someone at the same time, but Kreiak manages it surprisingly well.

124.

The two weeks on board the Preliator aren't easy for the Kinharians, who are used to dry warmth of their desert home. Harry knows that Atlantis will only be more difficult for them to handle, but he says nothing because, really, there is nothing he can say. They have their coping mechanisms anyway, and though Harry absolutely forbids the use of energy blades on board, they still find a way to fill the corridors with the sound of their sparring matches.

Harry spends the time learning to use just one crutch instead of two, and figuring out how to turn his ankle and knee without the need of the automated programs. It's a slow process but he intends to master it - because back in Atlantis a little girl waits for him, and he swears he'll carry her himself in her naming ceremony.

125.

Elizabeth takes over the process of getting the Kinharians settled in, while Harry makes his slow, slightly limping way forward and towards Tair and Leean, who wait with smiles, each holding an infant in their arms, with their _Haran_s Kharan and Shira standing behind them. Harry reaches out to ruffle Sirius's increasingly dark and wild hair, before turning to Tair and gently pulling the cloth covering the child's face aside. Lily is asleep, her face nuzzled against Tair's chest, her hair pale and her figure even smaller than Harry had expected.

"She's… she's alright, even though she's early?" Harry asks, gently smoothing two fingers over Lily's fine hair.

"Small, but perfectly healthy, and growing stronger every hour," Tair assures him with a proud smile, looking down with the exact same amazement and fondness Harry feels. Lily was her second child - but she had lost her first in a Wraith attack, so the baby girl is as unique to her as she is to Harry. That is somehow more comforting than Leean's experience had been - it makes Harry feel like he isn't so alone with the whole thing.

126.

"I understand the importance of progeny, everyone does," Kreiak says later, after Harry has introduced the Kinharians to the rest of the Lanteans and announced the name of his daughter for the upcoming naming ceremony. "What I do not understand is why so many, and with so many women. Is one wife not enough for you?"

"I don't have any wives - only mothers for my kids," Harry answers distractedly, holding Lily close and falling deeper in love with her every passing moment.

"We wouldn't marry him even if he asked - and Faije is already married," Carin snorts, rubbing her rounded belly. "We just want to make sure there's enough of his kids around so that if Harry goes off and gets himself killed, we'll still have a Guardian one day."

"Can you not just select one?" Kreiak asks, confused. "Knight Commanders are selected by test of strength and cunning - can you not simply -"

He trails away as Carin looks at him with disbelief. "You swore fealty to our Guardian - without knowing a first thing about his powers?" she asks. She turns to Harry. "You amaze me sometimes, you really do. And not in the good way."

"I knew I had forgotten something," Harry says without lifting his eyes, while Kreiak looks between him and Carin with a bewildered expression.

127.

"If what your people say is right, you could've killed me without even needing to fight - you could've won without losing your leg," Kreiak later says, eyes wide. "And yet you only used your fists and feet! Why?"

Harry can feel his cheeks colouring. "I could say that it was because if was supposed to be a fair fight - but honestly, at that moment… I kind of forgot," he admits embarrassedly, and ducks his head as the Knight Commander stares at him before lapsing into deep laughter.

128.

Of course, there are some troubles with the addition of new people - there always is. Though as a whole the Kinharians are glad to join Atlantis, there are individuals who weren't so happy - and after living their whole lives in a desert, the endless oceans surrounding Atlantis at all sides terrifies many of them. None of them have seen that much water.

The welcome party Atlantis throws - which starts with Lily's naming ceremony and ends up lasting almost two whole days, eases the strain a little, as does the fact that Kinharians aren't the only warrior tribe in the city. The Haneen, already eyeing the Kinharian weapons and shields with envy, and the Satedans, many whom are already asking if they could get robotic limbs to replace those some of them had lost, certainly welcome their brothers in arms without any reservations.

129.

Two weeks after the Kinharians join the city, Harry finds himself in the hospital wing, fretting over Carin who after series of contractions had been taken under care. He sits with her children and Afran, Lian and Carin's _Haran__,_ Freton, in the observatory, while Irana and Kiran try to make the headstrong Elosian calm down. She won't stop pacing around the room.

"Mom will be fine," Rair assures him with all the certainty of a seven year old, while Naun examines Harry's heavy metal leg in fascination, and little Kara dozes off against the Guardian's shoulder. "She's got experience with this, you know."

Ignoring the amused looks from Afran and Lian, Harry just nods, not all that surprised that even the kids of Atlantis know how he panics over things like these.

130.

Harry is dragged away from Carin's side by incident that brews across the city. A curious Kinharian Knight-in-training has gone off to explore, and ran into a faulty mechanism that had left him stranded in isolation laboratory - and though the Lantean scientists try, they can't get the doors to open. Harry spends two hours wheedling and coaxing the city to open the doors, before she manages to explain why she is isolating the Knight-in-training.

The scientists of Atlantis - now being a mixed bunch of the Ran, Iargosians, Kinharians and few others - prove out to have not only contingency procedures and plans in place in case of outbreaks, but also countermeasures. The Kinharians especially prove out invaluable - coming from society where majority of people were basically cyborgs, their understanding on how to fight and incapacitate technology was fairly effective.

The young Knight-in-training loses his mechanical limbs and all his gear and weaponry in the blast of the EMP grenade, and the city lose majority of the equipment in the laboratory, but it's a small price to pay for stopping the nanovirus.

131.

"It was long ago decreed that the use of these weapons would be only preserved against the Wraith," Kreiak explains a little later, as the scientist prod at the nanovirus, and the EMP grenades, already figuring out new security measures. "It was dishonourable to use them against your fellow humans. It is… fascinating seeing them employed in this manner."

"In here, you will get used to that type of things pretty quickly," Harry snorts. "For now, though, I'd appreciate of you would tell your knights not to wander around too much. We're still not quite sure what sort of dangers there are in the city."

"I will personally issue the orders," Kreiak promises - and then Irana's voice comes through the communicator on Harry's collar, informing that Carin had gone into labour - and that there have been complications.

132.

"The other twin was hidden beneath the first one," Kiran explains, showing him the newest images from inside Carin's contracting stomach. "And it's no wonder really; the second twin is considerably smaller, much more fragile. The first child is ready to come out and I have no doubt that the delivery will be successful, but the second child is wrong way around. We're doing all we can at the moment, but it might be that… that the second child won't survive. "

Harry bites his lip, staring at the image of the two children, one weak and other strong. "I suppose there is nothing I can do," he murmurs, wondering what a healer could've done about this - what magic could've done, if only he had known how. He takes a deep breath, glancing towards Carin who is trying not to writhe too much with the pain. If it was decision between the second child and Carin… "Do what you can, please," he whispers, unable to issue any orders, unable to decide, wishing he will never have to.

"We will," Irana promises, and then ushers him out.

133.

Hour later, he is ushered back in by half panicked Freton, who is a little pale and little wild around the eyes. The first child has been delivered, and the baby girl is hungrily breathing air for the first time and wailing her first sounds out with vigour… but the second twin is in trouble - and so is Carin, who lays unconscious on the birthing bed, bleeding uncontrollably. It's a blessing that Afran and Lian had taken Carin's elder children away - the scene is enough to give nightmares to an adult.

"We've tried everything, but we're at the limit of our capabilities - it's too late to try surgery, and at this point no drugs we could give her would be enough. She and the child are both only barely hanging on - " Kiran explains hurriedly while she and Irana push Harry towards the bloodstained bed.

"We're going to lose her and the child," Irana snaps, a little less inclined to sugar-coat it. "Unless you and your powers can do something about it."

They push him beside the bed, and for a moment he stands helpless and horrified and scared out of his wits. But he is still half in contact with Atlantis after trying to get her to release the Knight-in-training - and the city has seen many, many more births than he has.

134.

_'Here, here,'_ Atlantis whispers and Harry obeys, his power moving and his hands following belatedly the control of his and the city's mind, ghosting over Carin's stomach, her pelvis. _'Push, prod, soften, stretch, heal, repair, regenerate, soothe, relax…'_ the city guides, drawing upon eons and eons of Ancient medical knowledge, guiding Harry so that he could control his own powers in the way the Ancients had controlled theirs - in a deep, cellular level, drawing upon genetics to remodel, regenerate, renew.

As he recreates destroyed cells, knitting together torn tissues, softening them, strengthening some, making muscles contract and open, he is distantly aware of Irana and Kiran gasping and moving forward, to aid the child out as Carin's body under Harry's power resumes the delivery. Carin, still unconscious, is now panting for breath under his power, growing stronger and healthy and whole, as the blood flow stops, the damage repairs.

"Give him," Harry demands as Kiran gasps that the child isn't breathing, and the small, fragile creature that is his second son is immediately places into his waiting hands, his little body barely enough to fill his two palms. _'Strengthen,'_ Atlantis guides him, showing him how to take his power into the child's heart and lungs and _'close, open, beat, expand, contract, breath,'_ and give them the strength to function. The child's pelvis is aligned wrong, he corrects it with _'straighten, regenerate, heal,'_ and then he and the power and Atlantis move onto the weak, weak muscles and veins and internal organs and _'strengthen, strengthen, strengthen,'_ until the child, sounding almost surprised, starts to whimper.

Irana manages to take the little boy from Harry's hands just in time, before he passes out.

135.

"The little one isn't as healthy as one might wish - we still have him in close observation - but at the moment he's better off than you are," Irana says, when Harry wakes up two days later, with machine breathing for him and tube feeding him. "When you collapsed, it was like your entire body had just lost all the strength to function. Whatever you did to save Carin and the little one, it took a toll on you."

Harry sighs around the breathing tube, closing his eyes. What he had used hadn't really been magic, but something else, something much more basic. His very own life-force, perhaps. If it had been magic, he wouldn't feel so tired. If it had been magic, he doubted he would've been able to do it. "E'll liv?" he mumbles past the breathing tube, gagging a little.

"The first months will be rough, but he'll live. We'll make sure of it," Irana promises. "Go back to sleep," she adds, and with relief Harry does just that.

136.

Next time Harry wakes up, Carin is up and walking about, with the elder of her new twins in her arms as she approaches his bedside. "The little one is still too weak to be moved, but this lady is as strong as anything," she says, sounding a little happy and little sad and little bewildered. "You saved my life," she says then, as she settles the yawning baby girl against Harry's chest.

"You're a mother of my kids," Harry whispers, his throat a little raw after recent removal of the breathing tube. "My sister in arms."

"Yeah," she agrees softly lifting his weakened hand to rest on the back of his new son. "What are you going to name them?"

Harry swallows, looking down to the little girl, who rests his cheek against his chest and begins to fall asleep. "Hedwig," he says after a while, rubbing the girl's fine hair.

"And the little one?"

Harry hesitates for another moment, before sighing. "Cedric," he says, and it feels a little like a confession.

137.

Later Harry realises that it was almost a good thing that healing Carin and Cedric had taken so much out on him. When he can walk again without support, he sees it in the eyes of his people - the odd looks of hope and reverence and restraint and disappointment. "Kiran said that what you did was pretty much like intensive care and CPR and two month's worth of recovery time, condensed into a single minute," Elizabeth says, but that doesn't stop people from whispering that _the Guardian can bring back the dead_.

The fact that the Guardian had almost killed himself doing it is what keeps people from hoping that maybe he could do the same with their dead loved ones.

138.

It takes almost three weeks before Cedric is released from the observation - and even then Kiran demands to see him at least twice a week for the following months. For the three weeks, both the boy and Hedwig remain officially nameless despite the fact that Hedwig was strong enough to be named the day after her birth. But it hadn't seemed right, naming one twin before the other, so they had waiting - and when the naming ceremony for the twins takes place, it's for the first time indoors. It is also surprisingly quiet, almost hushed. Harry holds only Cedric in the ceremony with Carin holding Hedwig, as the Guardian speaks the words of the ceremony and tells the tale of Hedwig, his oldest, dearest friend, and Cedric, who had died too young, too soon.

Hedwig coos and wiggles enthusiastically in Carin's arm's but Cedric is silent thorough the whole ceremony, though wide awake. Looking between them Harry can't help but wonder how the hymn of new life sounds like cry of triumph - and, the same time, like a funeral march.

139.

Harry sticks a little closer to his youngest child than he does with the other, because even after a month or so, Cedric still seems so fragile that he doesn't dare to leave Atlantis. Kiran tries to assure him that the little boy is fine and well taken care off, but Irana is very matter of fact of the boy's health and never hides how easily children like Cedric suffer complications. As it is, Cedric's heart and lungs are fairly weak - and if they would fail, Harry's odd new healing ability would be probably the only way to keep the boy alive. He was simply too weak to perform any type of surgery on without incredible risk.

That is why the negotiations with the Havas start in the city - though only after the security team in the Trading Centre check them over. They come in group of four, led by the Tribe Chief and bearing gifts that manage to pull Harry from Cedric's side - even if only for a moment.

140.

"The ship has been sitting on the mountain for as long as we know," the Tribe Chief Drahan says, showing a charcoal drawing of Ancient ship dangerously balancing on a mountain ledge. "It has been held as a sacred monument for eons, and people thought that it was a giant turned into stone by gods… but recently we've came to be aware of it's actual purpose," the old woman smiles faintly. "In any case, we know that you can make use of the ship. You have one like it, yes?"

"Yes," Harry agrees with a nod, taking the drawing and examining it closely. It looks like there is some damage, but for a ship that was sitting on a mountain, it didn't seem to be in too badly worn. The most curious thing is that though the design is obvious ancient, it's not the same class as the Preliator. "And I guess that in return you want for something from us?"

"Yes," Drahan nods. "Our planet has a type of weed that is killing our forests and crops, poisons the wildlife - and despite centuries of fighting against it, we have had little success. We've survived by trading and by the graciousness of our friends, but last winter we lost almost half of our tribe to hunger. And the occasional cullings…" she grimaced.

"Life on such a planet must be hard. I suppose you wish to find a new home for your people?" Elizabeth asks from across the table, nodding in understanding.

"We already would've left Havath, but habitable planets are rarely uninhabited," the Tribe Chief agrees. "However, it is my understanding that your people have more extensive knowledge of worlds than anyone else - perhaps there are some… empty ones you might know about?"

"I think we can figure something out," Harry smiles.

141.

While Elizabeth starts to go through the database with her many assistants, Harry takes his team along with a team of scientists to Havath to take a closer look at the spaceship. As the ship is good two day's walk from the Stargate, they take one of the smaller instead, and with the amazed Tribe Chief guiding them, they make it to the mountain in less than half an hour.

"It's a mining vessel," is Irana's immediate verdict. "I recognise the shape from my study of the database with the Watcher - you can easily see that the cargo bay takes most of the ship, and that there's only fairly small space for crew in the ship."

"If you say so," Harry murmurs, a little disappointed. Another warship would've been a little better find - they don't exactly have much use for a mining vessel.

Finding a way inside the dark ship is no difficult task, though it takes some time to get the jammed doors open. As the Eruo Oricha wakes up to Harry's touch, Irana is quick to discover just how much use a mining vessel could be.

142.

"A… factory?" Elizabeth asks, her voice a little faint.

"A factory _ship_ actually," Harry nods, equally bewildered. "Apparently ships like Eruo Oricha all travel around these big factory ships, going back and forth between them and whatever planets, moons and whatnot they are mining. Ancients moved them around like fleets, each factory ship travelling with at least six mining ships, sometimes more, and they were used to terraform planets, create outpost, plant Stargates… The database of the Eruo Oricha is a bit scattered, but Irana is pretty sure there is a factory ship somewhere in the Havath system."

"And… and this factory ship makes _what_?" the Watcher of Atlantis asks carefully, almost sacredly.

Harry shrugs. "Everything the ancients used," he says, leaning forward. "_Everything_. Crystals, conduits, consoles, little ships, big ships, drones, weapons platforms, defence satellites, _Stargates and ZPMs_. Everything!"

Elizabeth swallows convulsively, looking a little wild eyed. "We need to find the Havas a really good home," she whispers.

"The best one ever," Harry nods, grinning like a loon.

143.

Harry takes the relocation of the Havas as his own personal project after that - though the scientists of Atlantis are only in process of reviving the old mining ship and not yet sure if they can get it off the ground not to mention about going out to look for the supposed factory ship, it is still something. Now they at least know that there were such things as Ancient factories. So, paying back in kind is more or less matter of pride - and there is the matter of reputation that needed to be upheld.

Though there were few empty planets he has visited, Harry knows that it takes something more than breathable atmosphere and plant life to make a good home. The Havas are mostly farmers, so they needed a place where they could farm - and where the weather and temperature was good for the crops they preferred. Then there were the more subtle concerns to think about - ones he would've never thought of, without the Ran.

"Almost all planets have different soils, so even if one type of crop grows in both planets, it might be more nutritious on one than it is in the other," Garoe the historian explains to him. "Our people suffered bouts of nutrient and vitamin deficiencies in Second Ranor because the plants we knew to be good for us didn't grow as well."

Harry ends up taking a agricultural specialist with him as he investigates this and that planet, until they find one which is very similar to Havath - except for the fact that it had much more water, the land being spotted with hundreds of thousands of lakes and rivers. It seems extremely fertile land, though, perhaps because of the abundance of water, making Harry wonder why it is uninhabited for a while.

The Havas don't share his concerns, though, and accept the offered world with enthusiasm. With Lanteans helping them move, they immediately begin cutting down threes to make room for their farm lands, and making camps which would eventually grow into towns.

144.

The mark of Harry's second completed year comes and goes as he works with the Eruo Oricha and the Havas, alternately helping his people revive the old mining ship, and helping the Havas in their move. He only belatedly realises that at some point he had turned nineteen, but it doesn't seem that important at the time - not as important as his children, as little Cedric, as the fact that Faije is starting to approach her time. With the resurrection of the mining ship, the migration of entire people and upcoming child, fifth now, there is little time to consider anything else.

Of course, that is when everything starts to go quickly wrong.

And, in true earth superstition, bad things come in threes.

145.

First, several Havas children go missing when playing in the shore of recently christened Great Lake Avath, which was just next to their future village. Second, Ijar and Eora discover a Genii spy in the Trading Centre, catching not only him but two of his underlings - and a bag full of what seem like Kinharian EMP explosives. And finally, the long distance sensors of Atlantis discover two Wraith hive ships - on course for the city.

Harry visits the city for long enough to hear that the Wraith are still four weeks' away, before listening to Eora's report of the situation in the trading centre over open wormhole, and finally heading back to the new home of the Havas and leaving the Genii situation to Elizabeth to consider.

"Being a father has made your priorities very interesting," Afran notes as they hurry towards the distraught Havas.

"You should try it - it's rather enlightening," Harry suggests, ignoring Lian's giggle and instead moving to take control of the situation.

146.

It takes some magic and some ingenuity to figure out that the Havas children hadn't drowned or eaten by some mysterious lake monster - they had been kidnapped.

"By people living in the lake?" Drahan asks confusedly.

"Yes, I think so. They're very faint, but the ship is detecting energy readings from the lake - and from just about every lake in the planet," Harry nods, frowning. He has been around ancient technology long enough to know what kind of energy emissions shields made - and though these are very faint, barely discernable, they are definitely shields. "I think I know why this world seems so untouched. All the people here live under water."

"And they took the children," the Tribe Chief murmurs, wringing her hands. "What can we do about it?"

"How about we start with taking a look down there?" Harry asks, glancing at the ship he and his team had came in. "If these things can handle vacuum of space, they should be water tight too, right?"

147.

The ship can handle water it seems - though, as Harry takes it under the lake, the ship informs him in no uncertain terms that there is a limit to the amount of pressure it can handle. Trying to ignore the fact that ancient technology has been getting more and more vocal with him recently, Harry manoeuvres the ship through the murky waters and towards the source of the energy readings.

When the submarines surround the ship, they seem more confused than aggressive - even when they begin leading them down and towards the underwater village.

148.

The under water settlement is easily one of the most fantastic things Harry has ever seen. It is enclosed in a half sphere of a shield, and looks rather like a sunken ruins of ancient Greek temple - except they aren't really ruins or actually that sunken, but probably build exactly where they were. The submarines push Harry's ship inside the shield, where several armed men wait with what look like rifles aimed to their direction. None of that is as surprising as how they look like is, however.

"Incredible," Lian murmurs, as they see the webbed hands, the fairly bluish tint of skin colouring, the almost complete lack of body hair, and what seems to be a race of humans entirely accustomed to living in water.

It turns even more interesting from there on.

149.

After day full of negotiations and explanations and assurances, Harry takes his ship back to the surface - along with his team and the missing children - and the spokesperson of the local Vedena lord. On the surface, he, Drahan and the spokesperson, Vneijat, sit down by the shoreline, and begin negotiate a treaty between the Havas and the Vedena.

"I would've stayed longer, but with the Wraith and the Genii, I wanted to get it over with quickly," He explains to Elizabeth and the others when he and his team are back in Atlantis. "The Vedena were _fascinating_. They've lived last six thousand years completely under water - their version of the whole bunker thing the Genii have going on, except the Vedena actually seem like they've evolved to fit their surroundings a little better. The Wraith have no idea that they're even there."

"Well, hopefully once this situation is resolved, you can look into them a bit closely," Elizabeth sighs, and nods at the screen where the approaching Wraith ships still head towards their planet.

"Yeah," Harry agrees, frowning. "No chance they'll be just passing through?" he asked, and sighed at the look the Watcher gave him. "Yeah. Didn't think so."

150.

"The thing is, our chances aren't that bad," Irana says later. "If these two are all there will be, then we can make it. We have enough power to raise a shield and hold up for a long while. We have enough drones to put up a fight. And we have the Preliator and though it's still not up to hundred percent, it can still make a difference. The only problem we have is that we only have one pilot, the Guardian, and Harry can't be both in the weapon's chair of Atlantis, and in the control chair of the Preliator."

"But we can still make it?" Elizabeth asks, drumming the table with her fingers while Harry frowned at the crystal screen, and his team share worried looks. Around the table, various leaders of different sects of Atlantis share the same worried look, the same firm resolution.

"We have seventy four percent chance to make it," Irana agrees. "Probably even more than that, if the drones work as we think they do in large scale battle. Unless the Wraith send more ships, of course."

They looked at the crystal screen darkly for a moment before Harry nodded. "I guess it's time we start preparing," he said, and stood up. "There's a war coming our way, and we have four weeks to get ready, people. Let's make most of it."

"What will you do?" Elizabeth asks, and then looks like she wishes she hadn't.

Harry snorted darkly. "Whatever I can. Right now, though, there are some Genii I need to talk to."

xx

I had so much fun with this chapter it's not even funny. Babies, chobbing off Harry's leg, robotic prosthetics, sci-fi knights, ships, the factory ship of which I've been dreaming of since 2005, I think, underwater people... hmm... lots of stuff crammed into this chapter. It's so much fun writing stories like this - one can do so much without having to spend tens of thousands of words elaborating on, I don't know, curtain designs and such.

My apologies for possible grammar errors and such.


	4. 151 to 200

**Freefall**

151.

The Genii are bound and imprisoned and under constant guard when Eora and Ijar lead Harry and his team to them. He's surprised to find that they are all young - the youngest is about his age actually - but that doesn't make him all that empathetic towards them, especially not after seeing that they had enough EMP explosives to incapacitate Atlantis's control room in single blast.

Question is whether they had stolen or bought them from the Kinharians somehow, or if they had been devised elsewhere - and if the Genii had been intending to use them against Harry's people.

"Pity I don't have truth serum, this would be so much easier with few drops of it," Harry muses while crouching before the bound Genii leader, who glares at him venomously. "But I guess we need to do this the hard way. Want to tell me what you're doing here when I believe I made my opinions of your people very clear? Or will I have to force it out of you?"

In the end, he isn't surprised that he has to resort to the latter mean.

152.

What the Genii team leader, Ladon, easily tells him under the compulsion of the Imperius Curse turns out to be more interesting than anything else. While Harry sends for Kreiak - who it turns out has opportunistic entrepreneur among his people - he contemplates what he's heard. Apparently, since the attack onto their capital city that Harry had been more or less the cause of, the people of Genii had been divided. One group is of the mind that it was better to stick to what they knew and could handle and leave the Lanteans alone - another wants nothing but revenge and justice, Atlantis and Harry's head on silver platter.

"We were going to use the explosives against Cohen's troops, and claim the control command centre in the Undercity," one of Ladon's people hurries to say, after Ladon has explained it all with a loose tongue and empty eyes. "If we could do that, we could claim control of our world and put end to the campaign he started before he will sent our people into war with you!"

"Campaign?" Harry asks, now more serious. "What campaign?"

153.

"Turns out, our Genii friends have been busy since our last meeting," Harry explains to the more or less unofficial council or Atlantis when he returns - with three prisoners and very angry Kreiak who wastes no time hunting down the leak among his people. "They've been trading all over the galaxy for every kind of weapon they just can get their hands on, by all appearances intending to use them against us."

"But only Ladon's group know about Kinharian EMP grenades?" Elizabeth asks tensely while the others exchange looks.

"Seems like it, but we can't be sure. Kreiak's little opportunist has sold at least some of his custom made grenades under the table in the Treading Centre," Harry answers, folding his arms. "I think it's best we start enforcing a no-weapon policy at the centre - and I want one of the weapon scanners we use in the gateroom here installed to the centre. I don't want this to happen again."

"Understandable," Irana agrees, frowning. "But what will we do about the Genii?"

"Cohen or Ladon? I'm not releasing Ladon and his people just yet - not before we find out everything we can from them. As for Cohen, well. We don't have the time to deal with him now," Harry scowls. "All we can really do is increase security and wait and see."

154.

After that, the attention of everyone in Atlantis turns to the Wraith, and getting ready to meet them. Irana works with the shield to improve efficiency, while Harry and few of the scientists look over the city's control chair to make sure it functions as it ought to. Harry has never had the reason to test the chair, and he expects it to be fairly similar to the experience of controlling the Preliator - but it isn't, it really isn't. The Preliator is _so small_ when compared to Atlantis.

_'Error, here,'_ Atlantis informs him, her mind's sheer spread enormous as she goes on pointing at a system, then another, and another, until his head is full of _'system failure, malfunction, dysfunctional conduit, error, error,'_ and he's half way ready jump up from the chair and just _run for it_. But he can sense why she's warning him - even a tiny malfunction in many of the systems could be fatal in a fight. There is glitch in the control system, the retracting roof of the drone-storage could get jammed, the shield generator in the south-east pier is failing, the power conduits near the power control room are worn… any one of these small errors could make the difference between survival and destruction.

_'Repair,'_ Atlantis pleads and fills his head with schematics and plans, blue prints of this and that device, showing him the storages for back up conduits. _'Repair.'_

Harry takes a deep breath, and gets to work.

155.

Two weeks into the four week deadline, and Harry feels like he could just lie down and sleep to death. Though he and the others have been repairing Atlantis to the best of their ability, the city was enormous and still full of little tears and rips, and it seemed like all those little flaws were coming up just then, all screaming for fixing. Almost every scientist in the city - even those specialising in something completely different than technology - had been roped into the repairs, and Harry wasn't the only one exhausted by work.

The rest of the city wasn't taking it idly either, however. Kreiak, who was now the unofficial general of all armed forces of Atlantis, was running everyone with any ability with a weapon ragged with drills and training. He also had his scientists and engineers manufacturing and repairing energy swords and shields, and by the looks of thing he indeed to equip ever man, woman and child of the city with a pair.

"Wraith are sturdy against projectile weapons, and energy blasts - but even they don't survive if their heads are severed from their bodies," he explains it with bloodthirsty determination, which more or less explains the whole base of Kinharian society. Then he forces Harry to carry a brand new sword and shield as well, not taking a _no_ for an answer.

And while majority of Atlantis prepared to fight, Elizabeth with her many assistants is while preparing for the chance they would lose. She had the trading centre and some of the few habitable empty planets they knew readied for possible evacuation - and se running drills with the citizens of Atlantis about how evacuation procedures would go. Under her command, everyone prepared bags of their essential belongings which they could grab in haste and be relatively well off if the worse would happen - and in her order, a storage room right next to the gate room was filled with emergency supplies which could be easily grabbed and carried off in case of evacuation.

"Just in case," she says later, and Harry wonders if it would soon become the official Atlantis motto, with how many times it was being spoken lately.

156.

Week before the Wraith ships arrive, the children of Atlantis are evacuated into the Trading Centre - which for now is closed for all business. Harry's children, their mothers and their families are the first to go, but not before extensive security measures which involve Kinharian knights, Satedan specialists and Haneen warriors for protection. Harry says goodbye to his sons and daughters quietly and somewhat sorrowfully, but he knows it's safer for them not to be in a city about to come under bombardment. Faije and her husband go as well, Harry is saddest to see her go, fearing that she would deliver his fifth child in another planet, and that he probably wouldn't be there to see it

"We'll take care of them," the four _Haran_ guards of his children and their mothers, Kharan, Shira, Freton and Usra, assure him before going, but it doesn't ease Harry's mind as much as he would've hoped.

"You better," he mutters, and watches his children being carried away through the Stargate.

157.

The week's wait is probably the worse thing about the whole thing, as is the tenseness that comes over the city. It is impossible to escape it, with the balconies of the city filled with Kinharian and Iargosian cannons and everyone walking around armed to teeth. The fact that it is unlikely that any ground battles would take place doesn't stop people from sparring and practicing endlessly, especially with the Kinharian swords. Even Harry can't escape from that, and together with Afran he learns to trust the strange weight and shape of his new energy sword and shield.

Then the waiting is at its end. As Irana raises the city's shield and the new soldiers of Atlantis man the cannons and rifles, the Wraith ships come out of hyperspace on orbit just above the city. The entire city seems to be holding its breath - and indeed, Atlantis is for the first time completely quiet in Harry's head - as they wait for the Wraith to make their move.

It comes by the means of transmission. "Surrender, and we will spare one fourth of your people," a pale skinned, yellow eyed Wraith hisses in the crystal screen, baring his sharp teeth. "I will even give you the time to evacuate before I destroy the city."

"Yeah, I don't think so," Harry answers a little incredulously. "Thank you all the same."

The Wraith hisses again, and the bombardment begins.

158.

"Well. It's almost pretty," Harry muses, as he and the others look up to the shield. It's almost alight with the Wraith energy blasts, glowing red and golden above them. "But I take the city can't handle it infinitely?"

"No. Couple of days of this, and the ZPM will be depleted," Irana agrees, she too staring above them. "This is why the Ancestors submerged the city, I imagine - lessen the strain on the shield."

"Pity we didn't think of doing that," Harry frowns her.

"We did - and we probably would've, if we had any idea how it was done the first place," Irana says worriedly, frowning. "All we can hope that they will stick to just this - and that the warlord doesn't use the same methods as the Skeleton Tribe used. They overwhelmed our city shields by suicide attack by the Darts."

Just then, the first Dart crashes into the shield, turning it brilliant white for a moment.

"Right. Time to go offensive, then," Harry murmurs, wincing as another explosion rattles the city shield. "I'll be in the control chair if anyone needs me."

"I'll start preparing the Preliator for launch," Irana agrees, and the spontaneous balcony meeting disbands.

159.

"Well, old girl," Harry whispers as he sits down to the control chair, Afran following him and pacing the length of the room nervously. "Let's do this. And let's make it count too; we only have handful of drones to use."

_'Weapons, launch!'_ Atlantis answers with surprising force, throwing open the drone storage's hatch. Then she shows him where to aim the weapons, showing him _'weak point, power control, hull regeneration control, hyper drive engine,'_ and they're both there, on the tails of the golden drones as they rush towards their targets.

The first Hive avoids worse of the impact, but second one takes heavy damage. Triumphant, Harry and Atlantis aim again, intending to take the weakened Hive Ship out. The weapons are launched and on the way, when Darts fly out to meet the attack - to take the drones and be destroyed with them to avoid damage being done to the Hive. Harry almost admires the move as much as he is disgusted by it, and prepares to launch another wave when the weakened hive ship turns and fires its engines. It looks like it's about to make its escape - before Harry realises it's heading to the wrong direction.

Desperate, he launches few more drones, trying to take the ship out before it does what it intends, but it's too late. Even though he manages to very nearly tear the ship in half, it still keeps it course and its deadly plummet - right towards Atlantis.

"The Wraith Hive is ramming into the shield; brace for impact!" Elizabeth voice booms across the city's communication system, and immediately after the impact strikes.

160.

Still half entwined into Atlantis's mind, Harry is immediately aware of what happens. The shield holds for just enough to avoid majority of the damage as the city sinks beneath the water under the massive blow of the Wraith ship - and then, with a weak flicker, the shield fails as the ZPM's power nearly run's dry. Together he and Atlantis rush to regulate power - to bring the engines online and the city back to the surface - but for a moment Atlantis is almost completely submerged without shield. Seventeen different sections begin flooding before the city stabilises and begins to push back to the surface - eight life signs fade away while dozens of others scatter in the water.

The city is blinded by the flash of the explosion and so is Harry, and they don't see the Wraith Darts before they are already zooming around the towers. The weapons fire starts soon after, but it's faltering and haphazard - many people in the balconies had been washed into the ocean and away from their posts, many of the weapons are unmanned. Their defence is shattered.

_'Weapons,'_ Atlantis coaxes him, but Harry knows that it won't be enough. Atlantis is without shield and there is still one hive up there - and if that would make the same suicidal dive, nothing would spare the city. They are almost out of drones, as it is.

"_You_ launch them," he says, sitting up, already reaching for the Preliator mentally. The warship still has shields - and whole lot more drones than Atlantis does. As he rushes out of the chair room with Afran closely behind him, the city wavers after him for a moment, surprised at his command.

Then she obeys. _'Weapons, launch,'_ Harry can hear her, and had he had the time to think about it, he might've shivered at the feel of the city's vehemence.

161.

The Preliator waits for him, already humming energy and anticipation, opening doors ahead of him to get him to the control chair quicker. Harry rushes past surprised Irana and almost collapses into the command chair, already reaching. _'Shield, rapid expansion,'_ he and the Preliator think in unison, and share moment of smug satisfaction as couple of Wraith darts collide with the expanded shield, crashing down. Around them, they can feel Atlantis, guiding her few drones to chase the Darts and blast them into the water with incredible precision.

_'Weapons,'_ the Preliator agrees with the city, and Harry almost laughs at how in synch the battle ship is with Atlantis, with him.

"The Hive first - let Atlantis and the people worry about the Darts," the wizard answers, and while Irana and Afran both stare at him like he had lost his mind, he coaxes lift off. Atlantis would take care of his people - and his people would take care of her. He can already feel them returning fire, manning the abandoned weapons, as Kreiak resumed control, doing his job.

Harry's job on other hand was to take care of the bigger threat.

_'Weapons,'_ the Preliator nudges him again as they rush upwards, and towards the edge of the atmosphere, towards the awaiting enemy.

_'Launch,'_ Harry agrees, as the first blast from the Wraith Hive makes the Preliator's shield strain.

162.

The space battle lasts only for some minutes - and despite the slight limp of eons' worth of wear and systems they had not been able to repair completely, the Preliator has the upper hand. Wraith ships after all had no shields, and with just few drones the Preliator can cause more damage than the Wraith Hive's regenerative abilities can quickly heal.

Harry is not surprised, when the hive ship quickly turns tail to run away, vanishing into a hyper space window before the Preliator can stop it. It stings a little, for both him and the Preliator, to see the enemy run away - because they both know, it's not really the victory it seems to be. Wraith tactics usually include running away and returning with back up, after all.

"The city, Guardian!" Irana is saying, when Harry comes down from the high of the space battle and the overwhelming connection with the warship. "They have Wraith foot soldiers in the city - they need help!"

"Let's go back then," Harry says, and with a sigh the Preliator turns to return home.

163.

The people of Atlantis don't actually need his help, Harry soon finds. Atlantis has taken out every single Dart with mechanical precision, leaving not a single one in air. In the city proper, two hundred trained knights, plus dozens of Satedans and Haneen, are making quick work of the Wraith in the city, proving the effectiveness of the Kinharian equipment better than the Kinharians have previously managed. The energy shields easily block the Wraith stunners, and where an energy blaster failed to bring a Wraith soldier down, one good swing with energy sword took them down. Problem was getting close enough and staying alive to land that swing.

In the end, there is really nothing left for Harry to do about the Wraith in the city, seeing that the actual soldiers of the city are doing a good job at handling it. As he hurries on, metal foot clinking heavily against the metal floor as he runs, people shouted him congratulations for sending the Hive into retreat, before heading back to their stations, back to their work.

"Report," he demands, once he makes it into the control centre.

"All darts are destroyed, but we have at least fifty Wraiths in the city," Elizabeth answers, motioning him towards one of the crystal screen. "We have some people in the water, but we've managed to get most of them out."

"Deaths?" Harry asks, looking up to the mess of life signs in the screen. It was impossible to tell them apart - they all showed white on the screen - but there was too many of them.

"Twenty four confirmed - but we have over fifty people missing," Elizabeth says, frowning with worry. "Most likely in the water. Many of them are too far away for us to do anything about, except wait and hope that they can swim back towards the city."

"I think most of those people are Kinharians - and I doubt they've done any swimming before," Harry mutters. "Not to mention that most of them have artificial limbs weighing them down…" He frowns and glances at her. "I think I'll go and see if I can get my people out of the water by ship. You can handle things up here, right?"

"Yes, go," Elizabeth nods, and Harry hurries off again.

164.

By the time the Wraith in the city have been taken care off, they've lost thirty nine people, most of them warriors and knights who had been in the balconies when the city had sank under the Hive, but some had been fed on by the Wraith foot soldiers. Nineteen more people are injured - few banged and bruised, eight have been fed upon, and when the warriors and knights carry them back, they look withered and aged, drained of their years.

"What can we do about them?" Harry asks softly from Elizabeth and Irana, not wanting to be overheard.

"Everything we can. To start with, we will try what the Ancient healing device you used to rejuvenate me," Elizabeth answers determinately.

"Yes. If there is way to reverse the feeding, then the Ancestor's must've discovered it," Irana agrees.

165.

"It doesn't seem like any more Wraith are on their way here," Harry starts, speaking to the various leaders and sect chiefs of the city. "So we are, for now, in the clear - but how long that lasts, no one knows. The city's power source, our only ZPM, is almost depleted and as of now we have no shields, and no drones in the city proper. Aside from the protection the Preliator can provide in a pinch, the city is practically naked and that can't last. So, first priority now will be regaining power in the city. Does anyone have any ideas?"

"We've hooked some of the Kinharian and Iargosian power generators to the power grid - it seems like it helps some, but there is not nearly enough power for the shield," Irana answers. "Nothing short of another ZPM is enough, I think. I think that makes the recovery of the Eruo Oricha pretty important."

"More important than finding another power source? How so?" Kreiak asks curiously.

"Sure, finding a ZPM would be useful - but if the Eruo Oricha can lead us to factory that can _make_ ZPMs, then I think that might be better in the long run," she shrugs. "Besides, with a factory ship, we should be able to manufacture all the drones we need."

"But we don't even know if the factory ship is still there," Elizabeth says. "So we should also concentrate onto finding ZPMs elsewhere."

"Yes, but where?" Irana asks in answer, and no one has an answer for that.

166.

As Irana leads a group of scientists and engineers back to Havath in order to repair the Eruo Oricha - though Harry ferries them there as it is simply much faster that way - the people of Atlantis begin rebuilding, and the evacuees are returned. Harry spares a moment for his children, relieved that Faije still has to deliver her child as the notion of his children being born anywhere else but on Atlantis doesn't seem right to him.

After kissing Sirius, Lily, Hedwig and Cedric hello, he has to go back to work, however. His wand becomes semi permanent attachment to his hand, as he travels around the city, repairing everything he encounters as well as he can, listening to Atlantis's now much, much weaker song to find the most critical damage points. The Wraith had attempted to sabotage the city when they had been there - and it will days to clean up after them.

Hopefully they would have those days.

167.

"Do you think that Irana's plan with the Eruo Oricha will work?" Elizabeth asks two days into the project, when the scientists report very little success in reviving the somewhat damaged database of the mining vessel. "The ship is so old and has been so exposed to the elements that it barely even works - with no sensors it's impossible to even start finding any other ships in the vicinity. If there even are any."

"Yeah, I know. It's pretty long shot," Harry agrees, rubbing his chin with irritation. He needed to shave. "We need a ZPM and we need now, not in some unforeseeable future from a factory vessel which might not even exist. Sure, it would be good, it would be fantastic if the factory existed - and worked - but right now… we need a bit faster solution."

"You have something in your mind?" Elizabeth asks, obviously trying not to sound hopeful.

"Maybe. But I don't like it much," Harry admits with a sigh.

168.

Harry stares silently across the bars to the three Genii prisoners for a while, wondering about the wisdom of his idea. "The genii have extensive information networks, I hear," he finally says.

"Somewhat," Ladon admits with narrowed eyes, glancing at his two underlings who share his suspicion. "What about it?"

"There are some things I need found. Ancient things. And as far as Atlantis allies, friends and trading partners spread… well, we don't have any actual intelligence gathering forces," the wizard shrugs. "Seems like a job your people might be easily be able to handle - after all, you found out about the EMP grenades quickly enough, even managed to get your hands onto them. It's the type of expertise I can admire, on occasion."

"…and what would we get in return?" Ladon asks, his eyes narrowing even further, but somehow his expression remaining unchanged.

"That little coup you're planning? I can help you with that."

169.

"Probably not a good idea," Elizabeth notes, as they watch how Ladon leads his people back through the Stargate - carrying with him the EMP grenades he had bought from Kreiak's currently locked up scientist.

"Yeah, probably not," Harry agrees, grimacing a little. "But grand scheme of things, we stand to gain more than we stand to lose, so… and now we at least know what the Genii are up to."

"And we've given them EMP explosives," the Watcher of Atlantis says, not looking very impressed.

"Yes, well, they would've found them elsewhere, now that they know they exist, so it doesn't really matter," and if that excuse sounds weak, Harry doesn't really listen to it.

170.

As the negotiations with Vedena were still ongoing, Harry decides to return there once the city is somewhat secure and the funeral ceremonies have been held. That's only after watching some of the drones in the Preliator transported to the city and giving the city orders not to hesitate if the Wraith would arrive, though. Without him there, she is the only one who could fire them, after all.

"I don't know how smart it is, giving Atlantis that sort of freedoms," Elizabeth says later, still not quite believing that the city could do that - that the city actually has a mind of her own and decision making abilities. "What if… what if one day she will decide that we…?"

"She's not a kid who'll throw a temper tantrum at us at the first possible opportunity. Trust me, she only has the best of everyone in her mind," Harry answers, not all that worried. Atlantis's mind is of songs and data streams, fairly simple and methodical and, yes, often very single minded, but there was not a single malicious strand in her. It still bewilders him at times, but after Atlantis had helped him save Carin and Cedric, Harry wasn't about to start doubting her motivations.

170.

The Vedena and the Havas welcome him with open arms to the quickly made pavilion at the shore of the Great Lake Avath - or the Veduseah as the Vedena call it. He, Vneijat and Drahan sit half in the water, as they continue discussing the mutual interests of the two peoples, and exactly how their coexistence would work.

Thankfully they have a thing in common - food. Living under water, the Vedena have no ways of farming and very limited diet - and as result their people suffer far and wide of various vitamin and mineral deficiencies - only thing keeping them all from lapsing into scurvy was widely spread strand of seaweed that offers them some of what they need.

"I believe that if a trading agreement can be settled upon, our people can live in harmony," Vneijat says after explain it all. "We're willing to offer support, several of our shield generators and abundance of marine food items, in return of more… land based foodstuff. Namely fruits and vegetables."

"I think we can be great friends, then," Drahan says brightly, and it's easily the most enjoyable diplomatic negotiation Harry gets to oversee.

171.

Harry's team, as varying as it is, is not the only "team" in Atlantis. Several of the other Lanteans go out periodically, not just to trade or meet with their allies, but to do pretty much the same thing as Harry does - check out new planets, make new friends, discover new things. Harry knows they had taken the lead from him, and though he went out mostly because he was curious and liked exploring, they went out solely for the benefit of the city. In Atlantis, contribution was the way of life after all, and those who couldn't make, repair, heal or teach, they explored.

One of those teams, led by Iargosian Scholar-in-training named Sivean, was the one to discover the first ZPM since the Wraith attack.

172.

"As far as I could understand it, the ZPM is used to empower an EMP field of sorts, that encompasses considerable area not far from the gate," Sivean explains to the Lantean council in a meeting after her team's return. "The EMP field is powerful enough to shut down all our equipment, and even Wraith technology as proven by some wreckage we encountered - though unlike the Kinharian EMP explosives, the EMP field of this world seems to only cause temporary effect, the scanners resumed function as we left the field."

"The field covers twelve small villages," Herak, Haneen warrior part of Sivean's team, continues, folding her arms. "And judging by what the villagers told us, it's been that way for centuries. They seem to believe that the field is some sort of gift from god or something - and to keep their gods in good humour, they have to ritually kill themselves on their twenty fifth birthday, or the shield will fail."

"It's probably a way of population control, the field only extends so far," Sivean intersects.

There is a moment of silence, before Elizabeth asks, "How much power do you think there is in the ZPM?"

"It's impossible to say without shutting the shield down and bringing the ZPM here, but if the field has been up as long as the villagers say, I doubt it's that much," Sivean shakes her head. "And at least several hundreds, if not couple of thousand people dependant on the field for their protection..."

"Those people aren't ours to endanger," Harry nods in agreement, despite Elizabeth's slight frown and how the other members of the unofficial council exchange looks. "Return to the planet and find out what you can, but leave the field and the ZPM alone."

173.

"If it comes down to it, will Atlantis's honour and integrity be more important than its survival?" Elizabeth asks, while Sivean's team returns to the EMP field planet. "That ZPM could make the difference between that and utter destruction - or worse."

"It means nothing if we get it by sacrificing hundreds of others - and if we do that, then what would that make us?" Harry answers frowning, because in the end he isn't sure. If it came down to it… "There will be other ZPMs. There has to be," he mutters, and Elizabeth doesn't bother to answer - his own paranoia does it for her.

174.

While Sivean works with the EMP field planet, trying to talk sense to the villagers about their suicide rituals and Irana still works with the Eruo Oricha, Harry stands by Faije's husband Jaisen and _Haran_ Usra, as she goes into labour. Harry knows he hides his relief very badly when everything goes without a hitch, but he doesn't care - after the drama of Hedwig's and Cedric's birth, he can't help but be extremely grateful that his third daughter is born easily and quietly.

As Jaisen goes to his wife, Kiran hands the child over to Harry, explaining that the girl was healthy and whole and would most likely have no complications what so ever. The girl is smaller than Hedwig had been but much bigger than Cedric - and as Harry sighs with relief, the child seems to sigh with him.

"Amelia," the Guardian of Atlantis decides, smoothing his finger over the infant's messy hair. It seems to fit.

175.

Harry half expects Amelia's naming ceremony to be equally quiet as Cedric's and Hedwig's had been, but after the battle and the lengthy funeral ceremonies, the people of Atlantis have been looking forward something, anything, to celebrate. Amelia doesn't seem to mind to noise or the singing, and coos contently against Harry's chest as Atlantis rejoices.

"After Faije, no one else is pregnant by me, right?" Harry asks afterwards from Kiran, who performs the implanting ceremony, gently shooting the subspace tracker under the skin of Amelia's shoulder.

"Not at the moment," Kiran answered. "We estimated that leaving few years between groups would be best - for breeding later on."

"Groups?" Harry asks, feeling an ill sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. "How many years?"

"Two, maybe three - though if special circumstances should arrive, that will of course change the situation. As of now, though, we plan another child group to be born approximately in two and half years."

"So, in one and half year or there about, you're going to do another round of artificial inseminations?" Harry asks. "Great, just great."

"It's for the good of the people, Guardian," the medical specialist says with suspicious cheerfulness - and if Harry had been paying his people wages, he would've been tempted to cut hers.

176.

"In order to try and find anything and everything left behind by the Ancestors, in hopes of finding still powered outposts and maybe, just maybe, some ZPM's while we're at it, we've been searching the database, and broadening the deep-space sensors," Drean, a Ran technician who is mostly in charge of the control room operations, explains while showing the crystal screen to Harry. "That's when we discovered this."

"And this is what?" Harry asks, eying the dot blinking in the screen just on the edge of the galaxy.

"I believe it's an Ancestral ship, Guardian, maybe even a warship," Drean says excitedly, hands flashing over the crystal controls. "This system was probably used to track down Ancestor vessels during the war - there has been so much to do, that we haven't thought to try and see if such systems existed, but now that our need is a little direr…"

"Yes, yes," Harry nods in agreement, leaning forward. "The Ancient ship is still active and moving?"

"Yes, very slowly, mind you, only using sublight engines as far as I can tell, but it is still moving," Drean nods. "It will never get here in time, not in our lifetime, but with the Preliator… the trip would take only about a month."

"A month's a long while," Harry murmurs thoughtfully. But if the ship is indeed Ancient warship, then it would be well worth it.

175.

With Irana and majority of their specialists in ancient technology in Havath, trying to coax the Eruo Oricha into working, Harry compiles a team of technicians, engineers and whoever else with at least a little understanding over ancient system. As the trip will take so long, they take a few days to prepare, stock the Preliator and get some equipment together in case something would be wrong with the other ship, before setting out. After saying goodbye to his children and feeling very guilty for going away for so long, especially so soon after Amelia's birth, Harry boards the Preliator and coaxes a lift off, leaving Elizabeth and Kreiak in charge.

"Considering that it's your city, you seem to be away from it a lot," Afran notes, as they jump into hyperspace.

"I know. I would call it ironic, except it isn't, not really," Harry sighs.

176.

Though with the mission preoccupying everyone's minds, there is little boredom aboard, the month spent on the Preliator is still lightened some by the fact that majority of the people inside the ship are Iargosians and Kinharians. Between the Iargosian teaching-plays and the impressive Kinharian sparring matches, there is no real shortage of entertainment. Plus, Harry is in near constant contact with the Preliator's mind, and together they plan various actions depending on what state the other warship would be in - how would they get it home.

And every once in a while they stop by a planet with a Stargate to call back to Atlantis and check up on how they're doing. This way Harry learns that Lily had gotten the flu and that Sivean had managed to coax some of the EMP field planet's so called Elders into visiting Atlantis - and that Irana has finally made some progress with the Eruo Oricha

"She didn't find the factory ship - but she did find records another mining vessel, the Eruo Astrum, which is apparently floating around in the Havath system's second asteroid field. They're taking some sensory equipment back to Havath to confirm," Elizabeth informs him. "Once you return to home, it will probably be the next in our agenda."

"Something to look forward to then, I guess," Harry muses.

177.

When they jump out of hyperspace not far from the distant ancient warship, the Preliator is the first to recognize the ship. _'Aurora,'_ the warship informs Harry, who stares out of the bridge's enormous windows at the warship floating in the space, almost identical to the Preliator except for the fact that it's much severely damaged. _'Reconnaissance.'_

"Sir?" Drean glances at him. "We're not registering any life support."

"With that damage, it's no wonder - the hull's obviously breached," Harry mutters, rubbing his chin in thought. "This will make things difficult."

"Well, there are the space suits - we encountered them some time ago in one of the storage rooms in the lower levels of the Preliator. We… haven't gotten the chance to test them, though," Drean says awkwardly.

"No time like the present."

178.

Leaving the Preliator in charge of himself, Harry pulls on one of the ancient space suits - which are surprisingly comfortable and _thin_, in comparison to what he remembers about Earth spacesuits, which had always seemed big and heavy on the telly. Afran, Drean and handful of others do the same, before boarding one of the smaller cylindrical ships, which Harry then guides out of the Preliator's hanger bay.

The other warship offers no objection as Harry flies into her bay, nor does she offer anything else - her mind is silent and dormant, asleep like the Preliator had been, before they had woken him up. Harry marvels the quiet for a moment, before blinking as he realised that it wasn't actually quiet. While the scientists get ready to work and Afran looms about him anxiously, Harry listens hard with his mind.

What he hears is not silence, nor the dreams of an old ship. He blinks, confused as he listens to what can only be called _white noise_.

179.

Soon they discover the source of the noise. Though quiet, lifeless and airless, the warship - the Aurora - actually houses hundreds of lives, all held in slumber in pods all around the ship. While Drean leads the others into the task of restoring life support to where the hull isn't so breached, Harry marvels at the hundreds of pods, all housing truly _ancient_ ancients.

"And they are all still alive?" He asks, wiping some of the frost from one of the pods.

"Alive and communicating, that's probably what you're hearing. All these pods are connected by a complex network," Drean agrees just as sheen of white runs over the hall, and air begins pumping in. "Ten minutes, and we can take off the suits safely."

"Okay. Then what?" Harry asks, crouching beside the pod. With the Aurora sleeping so heavily and so badly damaged, it was hard to day if she could be easily revived. And the Ancients, _Ancestors_ sleeping in the stasis pods looked so old that freeing them would no doubt kill them.

"I… don't know," Drean murmurs, frowning. "Maybe we could try communicating to them?"

180.

Afran isn't too happy about it, but as Harry is the closest thing they have to an Ancient - and the stasis pod's network is keyed into Ancient physiology - he is the only one who can safely go into the pods. "I'll try to recalibrate one of the other pods so that we can join you, but I have no idea how long it would take," Drean apologises as Harry lies down. "But we can pull you out at any time we wish, so no need to be worried."

"I'm not," Harry answers, closing his eyes and letting himself slip into the white noise.

181.

It's nothing like he expects. After he closes his eyes, he opens them again to find himself again on the Aurora, but it's completely whole, lit, and full of people. They turn to stare at him with shock, and Harry, not knowing what to say, stares back. Then he looks up, as a surprised thought reaches for him, and the Aurora brushes against his mind - surprisingly strong and lively for such old, battered ship.

"Inform the captain, quick!" a young blonde woman - they are all young, impossibly young - orders, and suddenly the ship is full of noise, as people step towards Harry, all asking questions at the same time, all asking for answers.

182.

"You must understand, after endless, countless years with nothing but ourselves to keep us company, seeing someone new is a special event for us," the captain of the Aurora, Valeo, says after managing to get Harry away from his excited crew. "They will have more control once they get the chance to process this event," he assures. "Now, please. Tell me who are you, how did you find us?"

Harry does, feeling a little awkward - these are Ancients, after all, the original builders, creators, _owners_ of Atlantis, the Preliator and all Harry now considers _home_. Not to mention about the fact that these are also warriors of a war they had lost ten thousand years ago.

To his surprise, the captain only nods, agrees, even smiles sadly when Harry finishes the explanation by how they had came upon the Aurora and found its crew - aged and fragile after so many years. "We suspected - we are aware of the progression of time outside the virtual reality we created to keep our minds virile," Valeo says. "We gave up the hope of rescue eons ago - and the hope for survival with it. Knowing what has happened will give my people solace, in our final years."

"Excuse me?" Harry asks, confused.

"This ship shall be our coffin, we knew it would be. But now at least we can go, knowing what has come to pass. I thank you for that. We can now die in peace."

The Guardian of Atlantis frowns. "Why?" he asks. "I mean, sure, peace of mind is a great thing, but it's not like you have to die." And it's the captain's turn to become confused.

183.

"Attention, everyone," the captain calls over the virtual command bridge. "I'm sure you all are now aware of our surprising guest. This is Harry Potter," he motions at the younger man. "He is the current High Councillor of Atlantis - and he brings us both bad and good news. The war, as we suspect, has been lost, our kind as we know them no longer exist. Many ascended, the rest escaped this galaxy, and what remains are the surviving human populations, and our old, hated enemy, the Wraith. Only now it is humans, and Atlantis as its new High Councillor commands it, that faces them in battle, not our kind."

He pauses, looking over his crew. "However, all is not lost for us," he says, eyes shining with new hope, new strength. "High Councillor has much to offer to us." He nods to Harry, who smiles awkwardly.

"In Atlantis, there is a healing device that can reverse the aging process you have suffered - I have seen it in action before, and it works," he says, telling them of Elizabeth. "All we really need to do is get you to Atlantis, and you can all regain your youth."

"But isn't that the problem?" Trebal, Valeo's first officer, frowns, folding her arms. "The Aurora's engines are damaged, and even at light speed - which we cannot achieve - the journey would take longer than anyone us has."

"Well, I have a warship right next to yours - and I'm sure we can figure out a way for the Preliator to tow the Aurora through hyperspace," Harry assures, glancing upwards. "What do you think, milady?" he asks from the ship directly, offering his suggestion to her. Around him, the Ancients stare in surprise, as they listen to the Aurora's delighted answer.

184.

Sadly, it isn't as easy as saying, "Prepare to tow the Aurora home," and being done with it, not at all. The ship is damaged and weakened, and as she is now she wouldn't be able to handle Hyperspace at all. On top of that the Preliator's energy reserves aren't exactly at maximum, so even if they could get him and the Aurora to hyperspace, keeping both of the ships there might be more than the Preliator can handle.

"I believe the Aurora's energy reserves might help us there," Valeo says when Harry rejoins the virtual reality to inform them of the problem after discussing it with his own crew. "The Aurora is badly damaged, but her power cells are still relatively well charged. The stasis pods all have their separate power cores, so if you remove the power cells from the Aurora, we will be still protected - though maintaining atmosphere inside the ship will be an issue, as well as any shield."

"The Aurora's shield generators are gone in any case," Harry answers. "The Preliator can extend his shield to encompass the Aurora, though, so that's more or less okay - especially if the power cells can deal with the energy issue. How we will attach the Aurora to the Preliator, though…"

"We can use the city-docking mechanism," Trebal suggests, bringing the schematics. "The Milita-class ships are designed to dock into cities either by the hyper drive engine stem here, so that they stand upright among the towers - or by along the cargo and hangar bay here, which was meant as easy way to transfer of cargo. The ships are obviously not designed to dock into each other, but if we angle the ships facing opposite another with their, well, bellies meeting, we might attain viable docking. Granted, of course, that the docking mechanisms are functional."

"It could work," Valeo nods slowly. "I have never seen it done before, but, theoretically… it could work."

"Warship sixty-nine, huh?" Harry grins. "Sweet."

185.

It takes better part of two days to get it work, with Valeo's crew ironing out the ways and programming, and Harry's crew, none of whom can hide their excitement about the project, doing the actual footwork. Once everything is ready, Harry's crew detach most of the power cells from the Aurora and transfer them to the Preliator. Then, stronger than he had been in ten thousand years, the Preliator moves over the Aurora to dock, careful and precise. In the end, the two ships snap together like magnets - two gigantic magnets.

After that, Harry checks upon the Aurora as well as he can. There is no way of contacting the crew, as he can't get into the stasis pods when there is no atmosphere in the city, but he does his best to check that everything is ready. Then, literal jump from one ship to another, he makes his way to the Preliator's control chair. "Let's get her home, then," he says, and the Preliator agrees whole heartedly.

186.

"Ancients, truly?" Elizabeth's voice is almost drowned by the excited exclamations of the others back in Atlantis. "And, and you managed to figure out a way to… to bring them here?"

"Yeah. Aurora is kind of piggyback riding on the Preliator at the moment - it's slow and kind of awkward, but we're getting there," Harry answers, speaking through the communicator while eying the active space gate floating not far from the ship. "I need you to prepare the healing device we used on you when you woke up - there are some six hundred Ancients in dire need of it."

"Everything will be ready," the Watcher of Atlantis swears, sounding breathless. Harry grins, understanding the feeling completely.

187.

Six weeks of very careful hyperspace travel later, they make it back to the city. It takes another day of preparations and security measures before Harry begins guiding the Preliator through the atmosphere and down towards the city, where they heavily touch on the pier, laying down awkwardly on the side like a sideways-turtle.

"First order of business, getting artificial gravity back online aboard the Aurora. After that, I need to take look at the stasis pods - if they are mobile like I suspect, we should be able to detach the crew without disrupting their slumber. That way we can take them to the healing device without any problem and have relatively little risk on them whatsoever. Then we need to get to work on the Aurora, though of course that will have to wait -"

"Nice to see you too, Irana," Harry calls after her amusedly. "I see you managed to tear yourself from the Eruo Oricha!"

"The Watcher was very persistent!" she calls back, hurries off, much to the Guardian's amusement.

188.

"Six hundred ancients," Elizabeth murmurs, as Irana and the others began bringing the Aurora's crew out. It turns out the stasis pods are detachable and mobile - and they levitate too, making carrying them fairly easy. "I don't know what to feel! Partially I'm delighted, but at the same time… I believe I am terrified."

"Terrified? Why?" Harry asks, glancing at one of the pods as it was levitated past him and to the city proper.

"Atlantis is their home, they build it - what if, what if they want it back?"

He glances at her, not very impressed. "Then, that means that the pyramids of Giza belong to the Goa'uld you told me about, right?" he asks. "What if the Goa'uld want those back?"

She blinked. "It's not the same," she stars.

"It isn't?" Harry raises his eyebrows almost amusedly, and walks back inside to supervise the transfer of crew.

189.

Despite the many medical officers in the city, Harry ends up being the one doing most of the work with the healing procedure. As the first incredibly aged Ancient - first officer Trebal - is helped into the healing chair, Harry follows Atlantis's process as she looks into the aged woman, relearns her structure, and then begins to renew her. Harry, having seen it once already, is not too surprised by the procedure, but Kiran and everyone else gasps softly with shock, as the woman's face grows younger and healthier, and her long white hair turns light brown.

"First officer Trebal?" Harry asks, smiling as she opens her eyes, blinking blearily. "Welcome home."

"Thank you, sir," she whispers with hoarse, dry voice, and promptly falls back asleep.

190.

Every other healing procedure goes more or less similarly with the crew of the Aurora. Even when renewed and made young again, the Ancient crew is starved and weakened in way Atlantis can't repair - in way which requires steady and slightly bolstered diet, and plenty of exercise. Atlantis's hospital wing is soon filled with recovering Ancients, to the point where they fill the corridors with beds as well and eventually take over the storage rooms around the hospital wing as well.

"Atlantis's healing devices are incredible. Some of these people very nearly went into cardiac arrest several times during their healing procedures, but the healing mechanism wouldn't let them die," Kiran says later with amazement. "And the mechanism went as far as to repair the damage in their _hair_! Dead tissue!"

"It makes sense - the sarcophagus technology was derived from Ancient technology," Elizabeth muses, though no one understands the reference. "Now what happens?" she asks after moment.

"Now we talk," Harry says, and goes to see captain Valeo.

191.

"I admit, there was talk of it," Valeo says softly, looking around in the hospital ward where good twenty of his crew lay, recovering from ten thousand years of slumber. "Some of my more… temperamental crew members are of the opinion that we should take control of the city and… offer you alternative accommodations."

"Kind of you," Harry muses, folding his arms, and the captain smiles.

"I have no intention of trying. I am a traveller and a soldier - life on a space ship has always been the one I live for. Atlantis, though my place of birth, was never home to me in the same way the Aurora was," Valeo chuckles and then gives him a look. "And in the end, we have no right. Not only does this galaxy and all its treasure belong to your people now, but we are indebted to you in ways we might never be able to pay back. All we can really hope is that there is still place for us somewhere in midst of all of it."

The captain glances at him and smiles faintly. "You're younger than I thought," he says suddenly.

"Oddly enough, that's the first time anyone's ever set that to me," Harry laughs. "And you can trust me when I say that we will find a place for you. If not on Atlantis, then on a ship or two."

192.

Some of the Ancients - or Alterans as they wish to be called - are so happy to be alive, that when Valeo suggests that some of them might wish to teach the new Lanteans, they up take the duties gladly. Mostly Harry thinks it's because of the people they get to interact with - after ten thousand years amongst themselves, the Alterans are _gleefully_ happy to exchange opinions with someone they did not know inside-out.

Others, though, are not that happy with the arrangements. They frown at the Lanteans around them, some even going as far as snapping at some of Kiran's underlings in irritation, calling them _humans_ in most unfriendly ways possible. More than once Harry can hear them arguing amongst themselves how they should take control of the city and chase the inferior interlopers out.

As for the humans of Atlantis, most of them can barely contain their excitement. The Ran, the Iargosians and many of the Kinharians, along with some Dranteans and Haneen, all gather around the friendlier members of the Aurora's crew, eager to learn anything they possibly can. Harry can see some of them looking nearly worshipful, but thankfully living in Atlantis has taught most of them that, though the Alterans had been a great race of people, they were not in fact gods.

And the ones who did believe that they were, are soon taught otherwise.

193.

The argument was in full swing by the time Harry got there - an Alteran engineer named Jares and Irana were nearly at each other's throats about some system in Aurora they wanted to repair, about how it should be repaired. The other Alterans were instinctively taking Jares's side, while the Lantean scientists and mechanics were siding with Irana. Harry on other hand was greatly regretting his decision to let the Alterans keep their personal weapons - many are already pulling theirs, while the Lanteans answer in kind - few had even pulled out energy swords.

"… like us to flood the Aurora with potentially lethal radiation, just because you think that we set these rules for no other reason than to be a nuisance -"

"You're the one who's turning the power cells on maximum, you imbecile! I never said I wanted to -"

"Excuse me, what did you just -"

"EXPELLIARMUS!" Harry roars before anyone can pull the trigger of any weapon, and noisy clatter of metal follows, as every single weapon from sword to blaster to even normal knives clatters to the floor at his feet, ripped from people's hands so hard that some of them actually fall over. He stares at the pile of weapons and when one of the Kinharians makes a move to grab his sword, Harry promptly flicks his wand, and sends the weapons to the ceiling high above them.

"Alright, children, how about we start this argument again - and the first one who rises their voice is not speaking a word for a week," he says, and aims his wand at the arguing parties. "Who wants to start?"

194.

"I can't and I won't apologise for my people. Their mistakes and shortcomings are their own, and I would do them injustice, taking the blame for myself," Valeo says later, after both Irana and Jares had ended up, to their shared horror, mute by Harry's spell work. "However I cannot say that this will not happen again. Not all of us are happy here. I'm afraid that as a people we're adjusted to… being the only ones whose opinions matter. Some of us are simply too… old to accept a change in that matter."

"I understand," Harry nods, sharing a look with Elizabeth. "But… I'm sorry, but I can't have my people fighting. Atlantis is too fragile for internal conflicts. If your people really are unhappy here, if this is just the first fight of many…"

Valeo hesitates, looking worried, torn even. "High Councillor - Guardian - " he stumbles a little over the title, coughing. "Guardian," he starts again. "Can I have five days' time to resolve the issue with my people, privately? I believe we can come to a compromise - but your interference might… hinder it."

"Atlantis houses well over twenty-three hundred people, captain, getting privacy here might be a bit problematic. But… we'll see about getting a section of the living quarters emptied for you," Harry promises.

195.

In those five days, Irana returns to Havath to work with the Eruo Oricha, not setting a foot into the Aurora again or offering her help with it. Many of the human Lanteans show signs of disappointment - most of them have held their Ancestors in high pedestal all their life, and reality had not so far lived up to the expectations. Harry can do little about it for now, so he only tells his people to leave their newest… guests alone for now, and hopes that they will come to a decision.

"They could be planning a coup," Afran notes in the third day. "They know Atlantis better than we do - they could be making weapons."

Harry ignores him and others who worry, who are suspicious, knowing that Atlantis would warn him if the Alterans would turn against them. Instead he spends the days with his children, marvelling the fact that Hedwig's hair has gotten a decisively reddish sheen, and that Sirius is now babbling - calling Leean _mama_ even.

Exactly five days later, Valeo comes to him with his grim solution.

196.

Four hundred and nineteen of the six hundred and seven Alterans they had saved leaves Atlantis, taking with them what survives of their personal possessions from aboard the Aurora, along with some supplies the Lanteans offer them. "They will go to the Sanctuary," Valeo says quietly. "It's a cloister of sorts, shielded by time, which was created some time before I was born for those who wish to achieve ascension through meditation."

"All of them?" Harry asks, half amazed and half horrified.

"They see ascension as a way of… well, it has always been a way to escape more earthly worries," Valeo says, shaking his head. "The alternative - living in a galaxy overwhelmed by Wraith, with humans in control of Atlantis - it did not appeal to them as much as that sort of respite does."

"I see. And you?" the Guardian asks curiously.

"The concept of Ascension never agreed with me," the captain chuckles. "I love life and the moment we live in - I love discovery and surprises and new experiences. Ascension would, I fear, take all joy out of my life," he turned to Harry. For a moment he hesitated, before fisting his hands, and bringing one of them over his heart - obviously standing in attention. "I would like to pledge our allegiance to you - and I speak for myself and for the others of my kind who remain here. We are at your disposal."

Harry considers him for a moment before nodding. "Good," he says and smiles.

197.

Many of the Alterans decided to become teachers, helping their new human sisters and brothers in arms with understanding and working with Atlantis - because, as far as they had came in two years, there was still the other seventy five percent of the city left unexplored. Others of the Alteran cautiously join the military of Atlantis, marvelling at the Kinharian energy swords and shields, and becoming pilots for the smaller cylindrical ships - Porta Navi, or gateship, is apparently their actual name. The first priority for the Alterans though was the repair of the Aurora - and manning of the Preliator.

"Though improvement of self is always a good thing, sometimes it is best to keep what you are good at - and all of my kind here space fleet officers. There are obviously not enough of us to man both the Aurora and the Preliator, but with the rest of the Lanteans filling in the holes, I believe we can bring both vessels to top fighting condition, as far as crew is concerned," Valeo, the new General of Atlantis space fleet, says. "With your approval, Trebal will become Preliator's captain," he adds cautiously, and Harry is perfectly fine with it. He enjoys flying the Preliator, but he is more attuned with Atlantis - and the warship deserves an actual captain.

198.

Harry is there when Trebal takes the Preliator out for the first time. With the situation with the Alterans more or less solved, the matter of the Eruo Oricha, the Eruo Astrum and the fairly mysterious factory ship takes precedence - and as the Eruo Oricha still refuses to budge from Havath, they need to take another ship out to look for Eruo Astrum in hopes of finding the factory ship.

"Our factory ships were the most important commodity we had in the war," Trebal explains in the Preliator's bridge, after Harry asked her how come even the Alterans couldn't find the location of the ship from the database. The female captain looks very content in the command chair and making Harry wonder if that was what he had looked when he had been a pilot. "They were heavily shielded and worked as separate entities - no one but precious few were aware of their locations or even their name. All information about them was always passed on verbally; none of it was written down or recorded for security purposes. We couldn't risk a single one of them falling into Wraith's hands."

"Makes sense," Harry nods. "Probably best we continue on that line of thought if we can actually find the ship."

199.

On Havath, they pick up Irana and majority of her people along with their research material, before heading out to the asteroid field where the second mining vessel was supposed to be. "We've made more progress thanks to our… Alteran… friends," Irana says, giving Trebal a look that speaks volumes of what she thought of them after Jares. "We're relatively certain that the Eruo Astrum is still in the asteroid field, and probably well preserved."

It is - and it is also very hard to get to. The Preliator can't even get into the field due to the fact that Eruo Astrum is hidden in the thickest part of it - and on top of that, the ship is in a canyon inside one of the asteroids. They end up taking two gateships into the field and down to the ravine, Harry piloting one and the Preliator's first officer Iuvo the other, suffering bumps and bruises from passing asteroids as they do.

They find the Eruo Astrum not only perfectly intact - but fairly willing to part with information.

200.

"Okay, now we know where the factory ship _is_," Harry muses while staring at one of the Eruo Astrum's crystal screens with completely disbelief. "Question is; _how the hell do we get it out?_"

The factory ship, named Thule according to the Eruo Astrum, is firmly lodged inside the biggest asteroid in the field. It's roughly hundred miles across at all sides, made mostly of naquadah - and, by all appearances, perfectly solid.

xx

These chapters are getting longer. Not exactly a bad thing maybe? Gonna have to start speeding things up a little, I want to see the expedition sometime before the tenth chapter.

Also, let's just assume that there was no secret information about Wraith weakness the Aurora was carrying and the whole thing in the actual episode was just a ruse the Wraith invented and inserted into the artificial reality as means of getting the Ancients to do his bidding - not that I forgot everything about it. Okay?

My apologies for possible grammar errors and such.


	5. 201 to 250

**Freefall**

201.

"As defences goes, this is perfect," Irana says, as she and Iuvo work on the consoles of the Eruo Astrum. "I have no idea how it was possible, but since the asteroid is mostly made of arn - or naquadah, as the Watcher calls it - it is impossible to take Thule by force."

"The naquara has been put through a treatment that has turned it very volatile - smallest burst of energy will cause a chain reaction that will cause a massive explosion, that would destroy Thule and majority of the asteroid belt," Iuvo agrees. "I imagine it was done in order to make sure that the Wraith cannot get to it - their mining methods use lasers that would trigger the chain reaction."

"Okay. How will _we_ get to it?" Harry asks, folding his arms.

"I imagine we have to mine, sir," Iuvo says.

"I thought you just said that you can't mine it without making it explode."

"I said that the _Wraith_ cannot mine it. Alteran mining methods uses matter demolecularization, condensation and transportation. That is most likely how the asteroid was created, by reversing the process," Iuvo explained, blinking. "If the mining capabilities of the Eruo Astrum are still functional, we should be able to essentially mine our way inside."

202.

"Thankfully it seems that the Eruo Astrum's engines are fully operational, so they can easily get to the asteroid. But it will take roughly four days to get through the crust, and if we want to get Thule out of the asteroid, that will take longer - and that's if they can keep the demolecularization mechanism working for that long," Harry explains Irana's and Iuvo's plan to Trebal after returning to the Preliator. "In any case, I think having the Preliator hovering around the asteroid field all that time might seem a bit suspicious for anyone passing by."

"I agree," Trebal nods, frowning and thinking about it. "Sir, with your approval, I will have some of my crew join their efforts - and take some supplies to the Eruo Astrum. Four days is a long while without any food, after all. After that, we can either return to Atlantis for the time being, or hide somewhere. Perhaps the second planet of this solar system… it is a gas giant, and should easily mask any energy signatures the Preliator puts out."

"You can transfer the crew and the supplies - after that, let's go to Havath and call back to Atlantis. Let them know," Harry says.

203.

After the mission is agreed by all parties, Trebal takes Preliator into the gas giant, and Harry makes himself comfortable for the wait - or as comfortable as he can. Around him, the mixed crew of the Preliator, housing good sixty Alterans, twenty Kinharians, and with Iargosians, Ran and handful of Satedans and Garoush filling the holes, work on small repairs that are still on going on the ship. Harry offers his help when ever there is something they can't put together without touch of magic, gaining some fascinated looks from the Alterans.

"I thought your ability was device based, sir, as you never seem to part with your… wand. This explains the five children, I had been wondering about whether it was a cultural requirement or something of the sort," Trebal muses, after Harry explains magic to her. "What I don't understand is why, despite your abilities, you have that," she nods towards Harry's feet. "Not only should your own power be enough to repair it, but there are devices in Atlantis that could easily re-grow your leg."

"I know," Harry says, realising that he _did_ know, that at some point Atlantis had told him. "But I think I'll stick with the prosthetic," he adds thoughtfully, rubbing his metallic knee. There was a reason why the thought of having his leg re-grown had never come to him, after all.

204.

"I've been wondering about something, and I think I finally figured it out," Afran says, as he and Harry go through the motions of the _her-taan_ moves. "I wondered why, after they failed to take Atlantis, the wraith warlord didn't just send more ships."

"Yes?" Harry asks, balancing his weight on his metallic foot - which wasn't hard, considering that it was heavy, the bottom was perfectly flat _and_ it could be magnetized to latch onto the metal floor beneath it.

"Maybe he's like us. We only got so many ships - and only this one's in any fighting condition. Maybe he doesn't have any ships either."

"The wraith number in hundreds of thousands, Afran, in millions. I think they have the ships."

"Yeah, but this one, he's the only one awake right? All the rest are asleep. And he probably doesn't want to wake the rest because he might then lose his territory, or whatever," Afran muses, as they move onto the next attack pattern. "Maybe he's doing the same thing we are, trying to get more ships."

"That's a disquieting thought," Harry mutters, and almost loses his balance as he's forced to shift his weight to his right foot.

"You know, there's a reason why Kinharians do both legs or both arms, and not just one," Afran says, giving him a look as he struggles to lift the heavier left leg up.

"I know," Harry sighs.

205.

On the fourth day into the mining project, the scientist still stationed at Havath send the Preliator a message, informing them that the Watcher of Atlantis wants the Guardian back in the city. The way the request is worded is so formal, that Harry doesn't hesitate at all. In half an hour, Trebal has taken him back to Havath, from where he takes the gate back to the city, to discover what's happened.

Someone had tried to gate into the city without warning.

"It was last night," Elizabeth says while Drean hangs his head, looking drained. "We can't tell exactly how many it was, or who and from where, but… there was at least twenty impacts."

"I tried to contact them; I used every frequency we had and some I invented on the spot, I really tried… to tell them that the shield is in place, that we couldn't lift it without knowing who was trying to get in. They…" Drean draws a choked breath. "I think they didn't hear. And by the time the Watcher authorised the shield to be lifted, it was already over."

"Probably non-technological world, who have no way of receiving transmissions," Elizabeth says, looking guilty.

Harry swallows, staring at the still and silent Stargate, not knowing what to say.

206.

"There is no way to tell where they gated from, I'm afraid, but we have a way to stop it from happening again," Valeo says, looking as disturbed by the incident as Harry feels. He nods towards some of his crew, who are carrying a heavy looking pedestal into the control room. "This is the long-distance hologram projector from aboard the Aurora - it's usually used for ship-to-ship transmissions. With the Aurora out of commission, it does not need it, so… we will install it to the control room, and it can be then used to across-gate transmissions. That way, even if there is no technology on the other side, you can still warn the people about the shield."

"Good," Harry nods tightly. "Drean, let the control room crew all know - and have them study and master the technology as soon as possible. We can't let this happen again."

"Yes, sir," the technician whispers hoarsely.

"Also, go and see master Sran - every day for the next week or until he decides otherwise," Harry adds. The recently named Haneen ceremonial master isn't exactly a mind healer or a psychologist, but he is almost as good as - and Drean looks like he would need it.

207.

As there is nothing else that can be done about the incident, Harry waits until the hologram projector is installed, tested and found functional, before returning to Havath and to Preliator. He makes it to the Preliator just in time to hear Iuvo's message - they were through the asteroid and have access to the hollow inside, where Thule was. Trebal is quick to bring the Preliator out of the gas giant and back to the asteroid field, where she leaves the ship on autopilot before join Harry on a gateship.

It is very _strange_ going inside a cave in space - especially considering how dark it gets once the gateship makes it through the several miles of asteroid. The cavern inside is much bigger than Harry had anticipated - the gateship's headlights are barely enough to light a fraction of it. "You could fit Atlantis inside this place dozen times over - and still have space left," he whispered, while guiding the ship towards Eruo Astrum's beacon, and towards Thule.

"Captain Trebal, lord Guardian, we have found a way inside. I am starting power up sequence - I should get the lights on in a moment," Iuvo's transmission comes through as they slid through the darkness, and soon after, the lights come on.

It becomes very clear why the cavern is so massive, as the lights of the great behemoth turn on section by section, revealing high towers and spires on one end, and great vastness the ship's pier in the other - and what looks like half completed warship ship, lying nestled on what seems to be a shipyard of the great factory ship.

"Avernakis infinitas," Trebal whispers in awe, and Harry agrees with her completely.

208.

Iuvo and Trebal are talking, with Irana intersecting her opinions into the mix as they work at Thule's command centre, bringing up old files and logs to see what had happened to the ship, why and when it had been abandoned. Harry can hear them only barely - he is too preoccupied by Thule's old, slowly turning mind, and the budding mind of the poor warship, left incomplete and nameless when her builders had abandoned Thule. And deeper inside Thule, Harry can hear the others - the gateships completed but never flown - that were sleepily waking up to the presence of people.

Thule misses starlight - the first coherent thought the behemoth sends to Harry, is what could be called a sonnet to stars and galaxies, except in images rather than words.

209.

After leaving the others to puzzle over the database and attempt to bring the ship completely online, Harry and Afran wander out of the surprisingly small command centre, across long, oddly empty corridors, and towards something Harry doesn't really know, but can sense. Thule's mind seems to follow him like an echo, like a ghost, showing him ancient dreams that resonance with ancient longing. Unlike Atlantis who is precision and function, and the warships who are action and strategy, Thule is design and poetry of creation - millions of years worth it.

_'Knowledge,'_ Thule sighs his first word into Harry's mind, after leading him into a dark room with nothing but a strange angular interface on the wall. _'For the Maker.'_

And Harry knows instantly what it is, what it does - and recalls something Elizabeth had told him long ago, about the Ancient Repositories of Knowledge. "Kind offer, but I'm afraid it would kill me," he says gently, taking a careful step back. "We'll find you a good captain, though, I promise."

210.

"It makes sense, the amount of knowledge one would have to possess to command and control a ship like Thule… it's not something you can easily acquire. It would take lifetimes to learn," Trebal says, after seeing the repository room. "I didn't know that there still were these type of interfaces, however. In Pegasus galaxy, with the Wraith… passing out knowledge wasn't worth the risk of it falling into wrong hands."

"Could Wraith survive it?" Harry asks curiously. "Because I judging by what I've heard about these things, humans can't."

"I'm afraid Wraith physiology is uniquely suited for something like this - it is through similar interfaces that they learn their knowledge," Trebal answers, running her hand over the odd, angular rim of the interface.

"So, a human can't use this thing. But an Alteran can?" Irana asks, folding her arms.

Trebal nods slowly. "Yes, but… I do not know everything about them, but what I do know is that these interfaces are made for adolescents - to be used at the beginning of their training. The older the brain, the harder it takes. I… doubt any of us here, or in Atlantis, could do it without considerable risk. That is probably why Thule chose you - your connection to our technology is strong even by our standards, enough to make Thule confuse you for an Alteran… and you are the youngest among us."

Harry frowns at that. Chosen because he is young. It is definitely a first. "Does that mean we can't properly command Thule?" he asks, glancing around them. "He can't have a proper captain?"

"I think we can bring some of the systems operational without the knowledge - many of them function by preset programs, so simple things like crystal and drone manufacturing we should be able to do, given that the machinery still works," Iuvo says. "But more complex things, for example, continuing the construction of the unfinished Milita-ship… that is beyond our capabilities without intimate knowledge of the precise sciences and engineering required to complete such a task."

"And I guess ZPM creation isn't as easy as pushing a button," Harry sighs, getting his confirmation from the silence that follows.

211.

They spend several hours in the ship, resurrecting systems and figuring out what they can and cannot do without actual captain for the city. While coaxing one of the systems which dealt with crystal manufacturing online, Harry can see from the corner of his eyes how Trebal and Iuvo exchange worried and knowing looks, but he says nothing to it. They know the facts as well as he does. They need a captain for Thule - and only one of the Alterans could do it.

He would never ask of it, given that the risks were forty to sixty that the information transfer wouldn't work, would go wrong, and prove fatal to the person doing it. He would never ask any of his people to take such a risk.

But he also knew couldn't deny them, if they volunteered.

212.

In the end, Harry leaves Thule into the hands of Trebal, Irana and Iuvo and takes the gateship out with Afran in order to head to the Preliator. It's not because he isn't much help - though he isn't as good at the systems as the other, his close connection with Alteran systems _made_ useful. It's mostly because Thule's mind is too much for him to handle. The more awake the ship had became, the more powerful had become the mental images he put out - the more complex. Thule was a ship adjusted to have a captain who understood every single inch of him down in the _molecular_ level, and Harry simply couldn't keep up with it without getting a headache.

"What's going to happen with it?" Afran asks, as the small ship flies out of the straight corridor the Eruo Astrum had mined into the asteroid. "To Thule, I mean? We leaving it into the asteroid?"

"It's an easy way to hide the ship, but no, probably not," Harry answers, rubbing his forehead, relieved when Thule finally recedes from his mind. "I need to talk with Elizabeth and Valeo about this, though, hear their opinions of the matter."

213.

After getting to Atlantis, Harry sits in the council meeting with Cedric and Hedwig in his arms - well, Cedric in his arms and Hedwig happily lying on a pillow in his lap - because Carin wants a day off with her elder children and her usual babysitters are busy. He doesn't particularly mind, though it gets some strange looks from the other council members as he rocks tired Cedric to sleep while talking about Thule.

"I agree, we can't leave it into the asteroid," Valeo says, giving Cedric pale, pale blonde hair a curious look. "I suspect we're going to need Thule too much to leave it into such a volatile place - not to mention about how hard it is to get to. If, for example, we could somehow finish the Milita-ship in dock, getting her out of the asteroid would be problematic."

Elizabeth frowns. "But bringing Thule out and into the open would be too big a security risk - if the Wraith would discover it…"

"I agree. We need a place to hide the factory - somewhere where it will be easy to get to, but very hard to find," Harry nods, running his fingers over Cedric's back soothingly. "Any ideas?"

214.

The most popular idea is hiding the Thule the same way Trebal had hidden the Preliator - in the clouds of a gas giants. There is one of them in the Lantea system, three times as big as Jupiter and putting up enough electro magnetic static to hide a technological _planet_ in its clouds. "The problem would be getting material _to_ the Thule. Lantea's system isn't exactly rich with naquara - naquadah - or many of the other elements necessary for the construction of Alteran technologies," Valeo says. "Also, Thule is a fairly slow ship, much slower than the warships. If it's discovered, escape could be… problematic."

"Agreed, though the closer it is home, the better we can defend it," Harry muses. "Has Trebal yet sent a report of Thule's usual material requirements? Or how much cargo the Eruo ships can carry? Or the Preliator and the Aurora?"

"You think we can simply bring the material to Thule from other systems?" Valeo says, raising his eyebrows. "There is a merit to it. Given that our society is small and our needs for manufacturing at the moment aren't very large, I believe just the Eruo Astrum can easily fill the requirements. Not to mention that our ability to manufacture… well, without a captain, it will not be hundred percent. Or even forty, by the looks of it."

Harry nods, but doesn't rise to the challenge when the General looks at him expectantly. No matter how dire the need, he would not ask any of the Alterans take the risk of facing the repository. "I guess we'll be bringing Thule home, then," he simply says and looks away.

215.

Like with the Aurora, the project of bringing Thule to the Lantean system isn't as easy as it sounds. With the asteroid all around the ship, it isn't like the ship can simply fly out, no. And the asteroid isn't exactly easy egg to crack - given that it's miles and miles thick.

"We are assembling a crew for the Eruo Astrum who will be taking the task of cutting the asteroid open," Trebal says, as Harry joins them in the factory ship. "We have already calculated the fastest way to open the asteroid," she adds, showing him the asteroid on a crystal screen - with thin blue lines like cracks running all over it. "However, with only the Eruo Astrum, it will take months."

"Any hopes of getting the Eruo Oricha off the ground?" Harry asks.

"We're working on it, but the ship is old and weathered," Trebal says. "However, we did find something else that might help," she adds, and shows him a star map - with a dot blinking in the vastness of space near one of the outer planet's moons. "I believe that is the Eruo Mara - and judging by what we can see here, it should be in relatively good shape."

"Let's go get it then."

216.

The Eruo Mara isn't in an excellent shape - it has suffered an impact somewhere along the way while floating in space for the last ten thousand year, probably coming into close contact with a meteor or asteroid. It is however in much better shape than the Eruo Oricha, and after Iuvo has tinkered a little with its engines, they even get the life support online.

"Hyperspace travel is completely out of question - the side pods took most of the impact - but judging by what I see here… the mining mechanism are all good," the Preliator's first officer says. "It seems the Eruo Mara was just coming back from mining mission in the moon - the cargo bay is almost full."

"That's good news," Harry says, leaning over the consoles and listening to the ships quiet hums. The Mara, much like the Oricha and the Astrum, is surprisingly quiet and withdrawn ship - she doesn't as much communicate back to him when he prods her, as she agrees or disagrees and leaves it at that. But then, as mining ships, their functions were fairly simple and of course their character's had to suit their jobs.

217.

Even with both the Astrum and the Mara working on the asteroid, Trebal and Irana both agree that it will take at least month if not two to get through the asteroid. Irana, who is most familiar with the Eruo ships thanks to her time with the Eruo Oricha takes upon herself to handle the mining project, while Trebal and Iuvo work on Thule himself. On the first week, they manage to get the crystal manufacturing online, though it's not as easy as flipping a switch, they are relatively certain that before the month would be through, they would be able to start producing back up crystals - and start fitting the Aurora with new ones.

"As there is no hope of us being able to handle things like complete ship construction or the more powerful systems - like the ZPM manufacturing - it seems to me the best thing to concentrate onto getting the Aurora to fighting condition," Trebal explains to Harry. "We are, however, making some progress with the drone manufacturing as well. Hopefully we will soon have both Atlantis' and the Preliator's stores full."

"Good thinking," Harry agrees, preparing to head back to Atlantis for good. "I'll leave the project into your hands then, captain. Keep us informed."

"Thank you, sir, I will," the woman nods, relaxing a little all the while straightening her back and looking more serious.

218.

"Here I thought you'd stay at Thule until they got it out," Elizabeth says little after Harry's returned.

"Despite everything, cutting an asteroid open is kind of boring," Harry answers with a grin. "Anything I've missed?"

"Since the hologram projector was integrated into the Stargate operations? Not much," Elizabeth admits. "Jaran asked me to marry him, though," she adds a little sheepishly.

Harry blinks with surprise, having very nearly forgotten that Elizabeth was seeing the Haneen warrior. But then, Elizabeth is usually so professional at her work that it is easy to forget that she had a personal life. For a moment Harry feels sting of pain at that - it had been so much easier keeping up with each other when they had been living together - but he pushes it aside. "What did you answer?" he asks instead.

"I haven't decided yet. I… it's complicated," she sighs, looking at the Stargate. "Three and half years," she says softly.

"Mm-hmm," Harry hums. "You do know that you and that Elizabeth Weir, you two _can't_ lead the same life?"

The Watcher of Atlantis only sighs heavily, and doesn't answer.

219.

Though Thule, the mining ships and all the potential they posses takes precedence over almost all other projects Atlantis has going on, it's still not the only one. In the EMP field planet, Sivean and her team still work on the villages, trying to make them understand that it is not their sacrifice that kept them safe. They have already turned two of the twelve villages around, but not all of them.

In the mean while, the operations of Trading Centre have both resumed and grown. Though the Alterans are still a bit cautious about taking any part in such trade, their addition to Atlantis has changed things as far as science and various equipment go. The Alterans still aren't comfortable with sharing their technologies, but in some things they don't mind the contribution. For one, the sale of Lantean medicine gets a huge boost after Alteran medical specialist, Sano, started working in Atlantis's medical wing.

Thanks to the Alterans, the traffic in the Trading Centre had gotten new popularity other wise, as countless of people come, asking for advice and wisdom. It gets to the point that one of the Alterans, Linquo who is a former weapons specialist and who, after ten thousand years in virtual reality, has changed his world views quite a bit, takes permanent residence in the Trading Centre, just so that he can advice the numerous people coming in, asking about spirituality and Ascension.

It's a small surprise for many of Atlantis's trading partners, that Harry remains the Guardian of Atlantis and the _Ancestors_ now work under him. The knowledge that even the Alterans would follow him gives Harry some new popularity he could've done without - but it also opens new doors, as people who formerly resented him for claiming Atlantis, now look the matter in a new light.

220.

"We've so far counted about half dozen of them," Eora says, as Harry approaches the table where the workers of the Trading Centre had gathered the _gifts_ their old and new allies had brought. Ancient artefacts - a tablet, a box of energy blasters, some life sign detectors, several crystals in _necklaces_ of all things, and so forth.

"Half dozen worlds that think that now that there are Alterans in Atlantis, they need to give all their Alteran equipment to us?" Harry asks, poking the pile of crystal-necklaces, already seeing that they'd be more or less useless - they all have the faint grey sheen of a dead crystal. "I bet all of these are more or less useless."

"Broken or out of energy, yeah," Ijar agrees, folding his arms. "There was one thing though," he adds, nodding to Eora, who brings up wooden box and from inside it she produces the familiar warm hued crystalline shape of a ZPM.

"It's depleted," Eora says mercilessly before Harry can get excited. "Linquo already checked it - it reached maximum entropy ages and ages ago."

"But the fact that it was brought to us in the first place is good," Harry nods, trying to hide his disappointment. "Maybe someone else will bring one too - one with some juice left in it."

Eora nods in agreement, and hides the useless ZPM again.

221.

After checking out the Trading Centre, Harry compiles his team, which consists now of just him, Afran and Lian as Irana is busy with Thule and Carin is still nursing the twins. It's good to return to the simpler missions and to leave the more complex stuff to those better equipped at handing it - though Harry's connection with Alteran technology made him useful, he is still no scientist, no engineer, and that is they needed in the factory ship. He is more at home with traversing on foot from world to world, discovering new things, making new friends - and visiting old ones, of course.

Though he has to admit, he hasn't missed the tragedies.

He has known and been friends with the Olatains for a long while - and it has been a source of pride for him. The Olatains have a fairly simple and extremely paranoid society that lives on foot, gathering what they needed from the abundant forests of their world, and never staying. They very rarely trusted anyone long enough to exchange even few words with them, but Harry had made allies with them - he even had worked out trading agreements with them and some of their other allies.

To find the magnificent forests of Olar burned and the society scattered by panic and terror hits him harder than he dares to show.

222.

The few Olatains who still remain decline his offer of sanctuary and shelter - but only for themselves. And despite how their children cry and argue and object, Harry understands the motivations of the Olatain elders as they hand their children over to be taken to Atlantis, and to new life.

"We have seeds, we have saplings - we will try to re-grow," the tired, weary new chieftain Leri says, as Harry accepts her youngest son into his arms. "We will not have the necessary time or people to care for our young now - and they deserve better. They deserve safety."

"I understand," Harry says, absently smoothing his hand over the child's back, trying to soothe his heartbroken cries. "We'll do all we can to help."

223.

The value of the Alterans proves itself very soon after. "Not all our food was replicated, of course, some of it had to be grown," Satus, one of the Alterans who had joined the many Lanteans working in the hydroponics' garden, explains while showing Harry a machine he has never seen before. "This is a growth enhancer - it was used on fields and orchards to speed up food production. It works by enriching the soil, among other things, and can speed up plant growth by as much as three hundred percent. We have few units like this in Atlantis, uselessly sitting in storages."

"And it can work for a wild forest as well as for a field?" Harry asks, while examining the devise. It looks rather like portable fountain.

"With little adjustments it should," Satus agrees. "I would merely need samples of the soil and some construction samples of the most common local plant life. If my estimation is correct, with these we can re-grow the Olar forests in matter of couple of years."

224.

While Harry, his team, Satus and many other Hydroponics specialists from Atlantis work in Olar and shoulder to shoulder with the Olatains, and Elizabeth works to accommodate the Olatain children in Atlantis and find them new foster families, Trebal reports back her team's process from Thule. Harry isn't there to hear it, but Elizabeth brings him up to speed after he returns from Olar with his hands dirt stained all the way up to his elbows - and smelling very much like fertilizers.

"They've ran into a snag with majority of the Thule's systems. They can get them on line, but they cannot initialize the manufacturing mechanisms - the ship won't accept their control, not without proper authorisation," she explains through the door, while Harry showers. "And only way to get that authorisation would be to interact with the Repository interface."

"Of course," Harry sighs, scrubbing his hands.

"Someone needs to do it, Harry, otherwise Thule will be no use for us," the Watcher says softly.

"I know. But I'm not going to tell anyone to do it, so you can stop that," the wizard answers, gritting his teeth.

"Don't want to get the blame if it goes wrong?"

"No. I just will rather go to hell than order someone to do something dangerous when I'm too much of a coward to do it myself - even if that someone has a physiology better suited for it."

225.

Day later, one of the Alterans - young science officer named Brevi, though young among the Alterans is fairly relative - volunteers to face the Repository. "Thanks to the healing chair, I am as young as I was when we went into stasis," he says when Harry asks why "Sano says that among all of us, I have the youngest physiology. I… might be able to do it with relatively low risk."

"I'm not ordering to do it, but if you volunteer, I can't decline you," Harry says, feeling heavy hearted and guilty. "Just… I want you to be absolutely sure. No one will blame you if you decide to back out."

"Thank you for the offer, sir, but I'm sure. We need Thule, and Thule needs a captain," Brevi says. "With your permission, I would like to take the gate to Havath and join captain Trebal's crew."

"Alright. You can go," Harry says, sighing, knowing that despite all his worries, the man was right. Thule did need a captain, badly. "Good luck, officer Brevi."

"Thank you sir. I hope I won't let you down."

226.

Trebal reports Brevi's success just a day after the young officer had joined her in the Havath system, telling them that it would take couple of days for the knowledge to take root and then they would have official captain for Thule. Harry heaves a sigh of relief and celebrates with everyone else, relieved that nothing had gone wrong.

In the following couple of days, he listens with amazement about the report of how Brevi managed to get the drone manufacturing online and how the Thule was already making _crates_ worth of the weapons. Brevi even had managed to start working on the ZPM and apparently was close to figuring out how to start producing them - making it seem so easy in comparison to how impossible it had been before.

Then, six after the science officer had faced the Repository, Trebal and Iuvo carry his body back to Atlantis, and the fact that Thule is still making drones seems like very small consolation indeed.

227.

"He suffered massive stroke," Kiran reports after thorough medical check and Alteran style autopsy. "He most likely experienced headaches thorough the whole time, before his brain simply…"

"There is a reason why adults aren't used for the Repositories - they cannot adapt to the pressure of the knowledge," Sano nods. "They can handle it handful of days, like officer Brevi did, while the knowledge unfolds inside their minds, but the more of that knowledge becomes available, the more it taxes the brain until it simply cannot handle it. A child's mind could and adolescent's, but the older the adult, the harder it takes it. And, judging by what we learned from Brevi, none of the surviving Alterans here are young enough."

Harry swallows, closing his eyes before steeling himself. "Alright," he says quietly while Trebal, Elizabeth and Valeo exchange worried looks. "No one here can do it."

"A child could do it," Sano says, and Kiran nods. "You might be able to - I took the liberty of looking over the medical records Kiran here has complied, and your brain chemistry and physiology is very similar to that of Alterans. In certain areas, your brain is even more advanced than ours are, which explains your more exotic abilities," the Alteran medical officer says awkwardly. "The Thule didn't offer the repository to you by mistake."

"That doesn't really help us - not only won't I do it, but I _can't_. I can't govern Atlantis and be the captain of Thule at the same time," Harry sighs, standing up. "I forbid anyone else from trying the interfacing - not even if there would be hundred volunteers."

"Thule needs a captain," Trebal says quietly.

"Yes, but unless you can offer me a candidate who you are hundred percent certain will survive the process, it will have to do without one."

228.

Harry knows that it's partially his fault, when he hears some of the Alterans consider having children all of sudden. Alterans, as far as he understand them, are fairly reserved when it comes to progeny - their natural lifespan was so much longer than any humans, that they could easily go decades, centuries even, without even bothering to think about the necessity of children. That was what had led them into trouble with Wraith - Wraith had multiplied much, _much_ faster. Now though the surviving Alterans were not only facing the similar problem of being out numbered, but they were also facing extinction.

Still, it isn't until they realise that there are no Alteran children or even Alteran adolescents anywhere in the universe that they really start thinking about progeny. Harry thinks Trebal and Valeo might have something to do with it - they want a captain for Thule even more than Harry does, and new Alterans, young Alterans, is the only way to get it. Harry finds it both twisted and somewhat relieving. Atlantis has lot of children, but few more was always a good thing, and seeing a new - truly _new_ - generation of Alterans would definitely be good for all.

That doesn't stop him from very nearly cursing Irana and Kiran for ever talking him into artificial inseminations when Sano informs him that his genes would be a great addition to the Alteran lineages.

229.

"You do not understand," Sano says, when Harry wonders about the wisdom of the idea - he is, after all, a human, and his genes would just dilute the Alteran bloodlines. "You aren't. We are in fact not entirely sure _what_ you are. Though you are more closely related to humans than to Alterans, you are also more Alteran than you are human - and your powers and your unique brain physiology is in your genes in way it never was in ours. No matter how evolved we got or how advanced we grew, Alterans only achieved psychic powers through spiritual evolution, not physical - they were never passed onto our young like they are in your case."

"So, what, I've got the genes of half ascended?" Harry asks, not particularly amused.

"Yes - but no. What I think is that you are the progeny of the ascended themselves - that you are going backwards in ascended evolution. One of your ancestors was most likely a true ascended Alteran, who for reason or another retook physical form, retained some of their psychic abilities, and had children, who inherited the powers through the Alterans genes - and those genes have reigned superior since, even though the bloodlines got more mingled with humans," Sano says, sounding excited. "And over the years, those powers, those genes, have evolved into much superior form - while keeping that distance to ascension. You and your kind are…truly unique."

"And now you want that?" Harry asks. "You want your people to have those genes too, these… psychic genes I got?"

"Yes. Of course, that is not the only reason. There is only so many of us and any new variety to our gene pool will be extremely useful. And, of course, there is also the side effect of your superior brain physiology," Sano says. "Your close contact with our technology. We can achieve similar connection, but with us it is much, much weaker than what you have - general Valeo and captain Trebal are strongest here, and they barely scratch the surface of the depth of your connection. It would be extremely useful if more of our kind could have that."

"Alright, alright," Harry sighs, rubbing his hand over his face. "I get the point. I got to warn you, though, superior brain physiology or not, I don't have your superior intelligence."

230.

It's a bit of a relief for Harry when he finds out that Alterans have children in the same way as humans - though their pregnancies last about a month longer. Harry had for a while worried that they would use their technology even for that, but judging by what he hears, the Alterans had tried that long ago, and decided against it. "Too much genetic deterioration," they said as way of explanation, and it was good enough for him.

Despite how amazing Sano makes his genes seem, only one women among the five Alterans who decide to start right away with their new progeny project wish to go with Harry's child - and the right away really means _right away_. Unlike humans, Alterans didn't bother to wait for the right time of the month - they probably used their technology for that, but Harry was happy not to know anything about how that worked.

"It's only start, of course," Sano says, hinting that more Alteran women would have Harry's children - but Harry gets the distinct impression that they wanted to see the results of the first case, before trying again.

231.

The single Alteran woman who _risked_ trying to have Harry's child is named Leticia - she is a pilot and has spent most of her life piloting gateships. Harry is somewhat dismayed to find that Leticia is fairly… practical woman. She speaks only of facts and proven theories, and doesn't care for speculation about anything, not even about the child. She also, unlike other women who had carried Harry's children, seems to have no inclination neither accepting a _Haran_ guard, nor lessening her usual work load - if anything, she seems to be working harder than before, mostly with the Alteran scientists.

Only time Harry and Leticia have what could be an amiable conversation, is when she demands - really _demands_ - him to name their unborn child. "You have named your other children, you will name this one," she says sternly, and for a moment Harry is so surprised that he can only gape at her. And when he says that he only can name a child after seeing them, she merely frowns - and then shows him the medical scans of the embryo, growing inside her - and that's a completely new level of _weird_ for Harry.

He later kicks himself hard for it, but when he sees the cluster of cells that would one day become a child, his brain simply seems to shut down. "Uh… It looks kind of like, um, egg. Erm, like that of, uh, a phoenix? Fawkes maybe?" he stutters and with a harrumph Leticia nods and walks away, leaving Harry terrified that he had just named his unborn kid _Egg_ of all things.

Leticia leaves Atlantis for a mission soon after, and Harry doesn't get to find it out or correct the mistake he might've made.

232.

Harry hadn't really realised what a relief it had been to know where all the mothers of his children had been at the time of their pregnancies - always in Atlantis, except during the battle when they had been moved to the Trading Centre. He hadn't acknowledge it, but it had always been a small reassurance in the back of his head, the knowledge that at any given time, even when he himself was knee deep in trouble, the women and the kids were safe.

Not knowing where Leticia very nearly drives him mental - but he vows not to ask. No doubt Leticia is just working as a pilot for some trading mission Elizabeth had authorised and Harry would not do the injustice for the delicate governing system of Atlantis by going about doubting and maybe even undermining his second-in-command like that. After all, if he didn't trust Elizabeth, then neither would anyone else.

233.

The Olatains call Harry and several others who have been helping with their plantation to celebrate, when the firsts of their most precious eheruan trees start growing. The eheruan are the Olatain version of olive trees - it is their main source of food, including almost all the vitamins and minerals the Olatain tribes needed, and over half of their medicine was derived from eheruan berries, roots and leafs.

"We cannot have a proper Eheruan festival before the trees bear berries, but just to know that they will one day is enough," Leri says, spreading her hands and calling the attention of her whole tribe. "Rejoice! Olar will survive!" and they certainly celebrate hard enough to make it seem possible.

234.

In midst of Olatain celebrations, still on going re-plantation and occasional visit to the Trading Centre to pick up some gear and equipment, Harry ends up being so busy that it takes him nearly a two weeks to realise that whatever mission Elizabeth had sent Leticia to, she hadn't yet returned from. But, as neither Elizabeth, nor Valeo or Sano seem at all concerted about it, he smothers the urge to ask, and instead enjoys afternoon with his children, teaching them the sweetness of the jam made of eheruan leafs. Lily and Cedric seem to enjoy it especially, though Amelia doesn't even want to try and Sirius ends up nearly tipping his bowl over and into Hedwig's hair.

However by the time over half a month has gone by and no one has spoken a word of Leticia, he can't help but begin to really worry.

Then she returns and as Harry finds out where she has been, he doesn't know what to think.

235.

When Leticia had left, she had been a slim middle aged woman with short dark brown hair and fairly expressionless features. Now her hair reaches her tail bone, and she has gained weight, softened around the edges, she has changed her white uniform into earthly brown dress, and there is a benign smile on her face that softens the sharp blue of her eyes remarkably.

Harry barely sees her at all - instead he stares at the boy at her side. "Phoenix," Leticia says to the brown haired, emerald eyed teenager of maybe fourteen years, who wears similarly simple brown garb. She motions at Harry, who is reeling inside. "This is your father, the Guardian."

And if Harry hadn't already known that somehow he has just gotten seriously screwed over, those words would've driven it home.

236.

It was Leticia's and Trebal's idea, one Leticia had gotten after hearing something Sano had said in passing. Apparently, Harry's brain physiology was almost as well suited for the Repository interferences as Alteran one - it had something to do with how his brain was adapted to handle his psychic abilities. That was when Leticia, who came from family of pilots, captains - and had history of having one factory captain in her family - had decided that Harry would father her child… and that her child would become Thule's captain.

Trebal had been the one to figure out the rest. Since that they need a captain for Thule now rather than in some unforeseeable future, she had figured way to speed up the process. The Sanctuary, where majority of the Alterans had left and where time passed two hundred and fifty times faster, had became her tool. All she had needed to do was to figure safe way in and out of the time dilation field - which the Alteran scientists had been able to devise. Then all there was left was for Leticia to go in and stay there about twenty one days in real time.

"Which is the equivalent of about fifteen years spent inside the time dilation field," Trebal finishes her explanation while Harry stares out through the glass walls of his office and at young Phoenix, who stands in the gateroom examining the Stargate. "Easily long enough for Leticia to have the baby, and raise him or her to be old enough, as she has done."

Harry has never felt so speechless in his life - so completely, so _utterly_ avoid of any means of expressing the sheer outrage he feels.

237.

Valeo is the first one to go silent, excluding Elizabeth who has gone pale half an hour ago, and Afran who hasn't said a word during the entire meeting. Trebal only notices Harry's reaction after the Guardian slowly takes out his wand and drops it into the floor, kicking it to the corner of the room - trying to desperately stop himself from giving into the urge to just curse the two Alteran women into next week. Leticia's eyes widen slightly as the wand clatters away and Trebal stutters herself into a halt, swallowing.

"Exactly when did I approve this little mission of yours?" Harry asks slowly, folding his fingers amongst each other, knuckles white. When the two women merely glance at each other, uncertain, the wizard turns to Valeo. "I know Elizabeth wouldn't authorise this, she knows better. So does Kreiak. So, you had to."

"Guardian - Thule needs a captain," Trebal starts, and falls silent at Harry's sharp glare. She swallows, and tries again. "We thought that the approval for this type of mission would be obvious - it was the fastest way -"

"Shut up, captain," Harry snaps, turning to Valeo. "Did you authorise Leticia's mission?"

"Yes. It seemed… the fastest and most logical solution," Valeo says quietly.

"One you didn't think to run by me, because my _approval_ for having you _kidnap_ my unborn child and raise him without neither my knowledge, say so or contribution was so bleeding _obvious_ - I mean, obviously I look after my other children and their mothers because I just happen to have the time, not because I'm actually emotionally invested with them. Because of course my children are nothing but means to end to me, just like they seem to be for you," Harry hisses through clenched teeth. "And lets not even _consider_ the concept that my kind start training with our powers, our magic, at age of eleven - important age for a young magician's development which, for Phoenix, apparently came and went three years."

The Alterans stare at him wide eyed and silent. Harry snorts, standing up. "Valeo, you've officially lost your place in the Council - and you've had me seriously considering whether or not I need to find a new general for the fleet. Trebal, you can expect me to have a chat with Preliator on whether or not he would prefer another captain. And _you_," Harry turns to Leticia and stops, because her face is twisted into half horrified, half remorseful grimace. "You I _might_ talk to later," he says finally in disgust. "Right now, I can't even _look at you_."

He almost regrets that not even Afran comes after him when he walks out of the room - he was at the knife-edge of his control and he would've loved to lash out at someone, anyone. Instead, he called for Kreiak, and spent the rest of the day venting his white hot fury against the man's shield and sword.

238.

Harry is shivering with the remains of his anger and bone deep exhaustion when he makes it to his room, sweaty and bruised and feeling even worse than he had before. He is grateful that Afran isn't there waiting for him - the _Haran_ knows him too well to be, it seems - but what he finds seems even worse, than his _Haran's_ company would've been.

Phoenix looks so… strange. Harry can see the family resemblance very clearly - Phoenix has his eyes, his jaw, even his nose, and though he had inherited his brown hair from Leticia, the wild quality to it is from Harry. Unlike before, though, the boy no longer has a straight and proud posture, and instead he sits slumped and small on Harry's bed. "Mother tells me that you are angry," the boy says, staring at the floor, at his hand made sandals. "Because of me."

For a moment, two sides of Harry fight against each other - the angry, outraged father he was, and the awkward teenager he himself used to be just a little while ago. Somehow they both win and lose at the same time, and Harry slumps down at well, sliding down along a wall and to the floor. "Not because of you," he says, feeling bone-tired, the strength of his anger completely drained. He was still mad, would probably be for years, but it really wasn't Phoenix's fault. "Because of General Valeo, Captain Trebal and your mother. They presumed too much."

"Mother said to me that it was necessary - that you need me to command Thule. T-That I had a great destiny and that I should be strong, and prepared," Phoenix says, not looking at him. "She said… she said you'd be p-proud of me."

Harry closes his eyes, sighs, and really, _really_ hates the universe.

239.

At Harry weary prodding, Phoenix tells him of the Sanctuary, and of his and his mother's home. There was a village in the Sanctuary, with dozens of people - progeny of the Alterans who had went into the Sanctuary and some humans from even earlier back, who had died or ascended eons ago in the Sanctuary's time and left their children behind. The village life had been simple, everything had been made or worked by hand as there was no machinery or technology what so ever there. Leticia had raised Phoenix among the villagers regardless of the lack of technology - teaching him Alteran sciences and history while the village had taught him spirituality and meditation. It had, by all appearances, been idyllic and peaceful life - much more so than Harry's own had been. Or that of any Pegasus's inhabitant's for that matter.

The more realistic part of Harry's brain knows that Phoenix probably has had a better childhood than any other of Harry's children would have in Atlantis. Pegasus isn't a peaceful galaxy after all, and Atlantis is smack in middle of it. It doesn't soothe his ruffled feathers any, though.

"If I had known that you would not… you would not want me, I would have preferred to stay there," Phoenix mutters, his shoulders straightening a little, and offended look coming to his eyes - probably looking very much like Harry himself had, when he had at his age and easily angered.

"That's not it, Phoenix," Harry snorts softly. "Of course I want you. I would've never consented to her having you if I didn't. That's the point. When your mother went to the Sanctuary and had and raised you there - she denied me the opportunity. Look at you - you're young man already, and I didn't get to see you become that. Because of her - and the others."

The boy frowns and carefully glances at him. "Does that mean I will become Thule's captain, like mother says I will?"

Harry scowls, and has no answer for that.

240.

Leticia comes to see Harry not much after Phoenix has left - and though Harry knows he should've worried after the boy, it was his first day in Atlantis after all, and it was easy place to get lost in, he hadn't had the strength to stop him. He doesn't have the strength to face Leticia either, but knowing that it's ahead of him sooner or later and figuring it's best to face her when he's out of energy and less likely to yell at her, he lets her in.

"I understand that you are very angry at me, and I think I understand why - my time in the Sanctuary has taught me much, not just about humility, but about people, about myself - and most of all, about humans. Your kind are more emotional than Alterans are, Phoenix taught me that when he was growing up," the woman starts. "I just… I wish you will not take your anger out on him. He is a good and bright child, brilliant even - kind and gentle. None of this is his fault - he doesn't deserve your wrath."

"He never had it," Harry answers, staring at her hard. "You do - but you don't regret what you did, do you?"

Leticia frowns and then shakers her head, pushing her now much, much longer hair behind her ear. "No, I don't. Because despite the injustice of it… He had a good childhood, the best I could manage to give, and he grew up happy. That is more than can be guaranteed for any other child of Atlantis. Even yours."

"Even mine," Harry repeats flatly, and looks away. "Regardless of whether he is suited or not, Phoenix won't become Thule's captain - I won't authorise because, thanks to you, I don't know him. You stole his childhood from me - and I will never forgive you for that. Any of you."

"So as long as you don't blame Phoenix for it, I can live with that," Leticia says, bowing her head and leaving him alone without another word.

241.

"It's pretty harsh, what you did to Valeo and Trebal, but I can understand," Elizabeth says to him the next day, while the two Milita ship captains remain blessedly absent. "They took too many liberties. But, in their defence, in their own society it wouldn't have been considered even slightly presumptuous - for them it would be just about taking somewhat bold initiative."

"Well, that makes everything alright, doesn't it?" Harry rolls his eyes.

"Of course it doesn't - but you need to understand. Alterans are very… practical sort of people. And judging by what I understand, they very rarely get that fond of each other - or even of their children. They don't see it the way you do." Elizabeth sighs, and nudges his side. "I'm not saying you have to approve their actions. Just… see it for what it was, for them."

"And what was it, really?"

"Case of misinformation and theory that didn't pan out the way they thought it would," she says. "You're the people person - and they're your people. Try and understand? Half of them are already wondering if you're going to kick them all out for this."

"They know we can't afford to do that," Harry mutters, a little bitterly.

"They might - but they also know now that what they think they now might not be what is actually going on."

242.

It's mostly thanks to Elizabeth that Harry doesn't take Valeo's position as the general from him - and in the end, he doesn't even talk to Preliator about getting him a new captain. It makes most of the Alterans relax, but when he doesn't restore Valeo's position in the council, they seem at first worried, then indignant.

"I'm letting you all keep your jobs, because I know you can do them, you are excellent at them. But now I also know you can't be trusted with authority over other people," Harry says calmly, when the first Alteran comes to him, demanding answers. "If your people think they can take liberties with the progeny of their Guardian - their High Councillor - then I'd dread to think what you could think of doing to other humans here. I'm sorry, but that's a bridge you burned quite efficiently."

They eventually seem to understand that his word is more or less final - but though they seem to understand the situation, there is one among them who does not bend quietly to Harry's decision.

243.

Even though Harry holds nothing against Phoenix, the boy holds everything against him after he finds out about Harry's decision. Leticia had raised the boy to the knowledge that he would become the captain of the factory ship - that it was his destiny, his reason for existence - and having that taken away from him does not make him a happy boy. Harry ignores the boy's protests and proclamations of eternal hatred and future vengeance as well as he can, all the while noticing the similarities of their upbringing and so called destinies. Somewhere some demented god is laughing at him, he's certain of it.

He knows, though, that Phoenix is angry because it's really all he can be at this point. Atlantis is foreign to him, he doesn't know or understand the people - and despite Leticia's best attempts, explanations of technology is not the same thing as the technology itself. The screens, the consoles, the transporters, they are all completely unknown to the boy - and it's easier for Phoenix to be angry at Harry than afraid of his new home or homesick for the old, simpler one. Harry knows the feeling fairly well.

Harry bears with it up until the point when Leticia storms into his and Afran's room in the middle of the night, and his fears about the effects of Phoenix's lack of magical schooling are proven right.

244.

"I've tried to make him calm down - it happened every now and then in the Sanctuary, and meditation and restraint often worked… but he says he can't close his mind to meditate here," Leticia says frantically, as Harry stares at her and Phoenix's room. The boy is sitting in the middle of the room, desperately trying to meditate by the looks of it - and around him every single item in the room is levitating, beds and tables included. Phoenix alone is rooted to the floor.

Harry shakes his head. Suppressing magic never works - even he knows that. "Stay here," he says to Leticia and Afran, and steps into the room, ducking the levitating beddings and what was apparently the contents of entire book shelf. He can feel Phoenix's power trying to wrench him from gravity too, but he bats the attempt aside with his own magic almost absently. "Phoenix. Listen to me. You're trying to control it, pull it back down, force it under your will. It won't work - you don't have the right training for that control. You need to let it fly, or it will burn you from inside. Can you hear me? Stop restraining it - let the power go. Let it blow up."

"But it will damage -"

"I'll make sure it doesn't," Harry says, taking out his wand and silently shielding himself, the boy and the room. "Now, let it go."

The boy quivers, around him and Harry every item in the room explodes.

245.

Harry doesn't quite say _I told you so_, when absently repairs the destroyed items and furniture once Phoenix's burst of uncontrolled magic is over. "Suppressing this could kill him, and ignoring it will just let it run rampant and maybe kill someone else," he simply says, while exhausted Phoenix leans to his mother's side. "We can only hope I can teach him enough to enable him to at least manage it without risking anyone."

"I do not want to learn anything from you," Phoenix scowls at him feebly.

"And you think that matters?" Harry asks, feeling a little ill at how much he sounds like Snape. "I am the only one who _can_ teach you, and you will learn control… or you will have to leave the city. If you can't control your powers, then you are a threat to those around you, and as the Guardian of Atlantis I can't permit that - even if you are my son."

"Listen to him, Phoenix," Leticia whispers, reaching out to run her hand over the boy's frowning face. "You are intelligent boy - you can learn this. I know you can."

"But I hate him, mother," Phoenix hisses, making Harry's stomach clench.

"You don't need to like me, in order to learn from me," he says simply and looks away, eyes stinging.

246.

Just about everyone who knows anything about Harry's abilities agrees that he is the only one who can teach Phoenix - though many do argue against the means and the terms, as the word _magic_ seems a bit offensive to most Alterans. Despite the agreements and the objections, there is only one who can actually help him with that tutelage - and that's Atlantis. While Phoenix recovers from his mental and magical exhaustion, Harry sits down in Atlantis's control chair, and together they devise the means to teach Harry's youngest, eldest child.

Every single matter converter in city is more or less hijacked by their project, as Harry and Atlantis draw upon his memories, Harry remembering and Atlantis cleaning up what his brain has stored by his mind can't clearly recall. Together re-create the books he has read, the charts he has seen, and compile new ones from knowledge that is more or less unique to Harry, and create library of magical knowledge almost literally from thin air.

Harry has the books all delivered to his new quarters - new, because the single room with a small shower he shares with Afran is no longer big enough - and there he shelves them into a small library, which was no where near sufficient, but would have to do. The boy isn't happy about it, as Harry devises a schedule for daily lessons about magic and makes Phoenix, in essence, his apprentice, but he doesn't argue against it either.

247.

Harry marvels Atlantis's sheer capability only for a small while, thanking the city silently for recreating the books in two languages - English and Alteran - before leaving Phoenix with one about basics and going to attend to his duties as the Guardian. He knows that during the incident, the city has gone tense and worried, fearing his final reaction and only relaxing once they see him returning to business as normal. Elizabeth tells him that some had worried that he would punish all of the Alterans - make example of them - but after all has been said and done, Harry has never been one to enjoy dishing out punishments.

He can, however, hold a grudge until kingdom comes and falls.

"The watcher has explained me the importance of family among your kind, and the importance of children," Valeo says in subdued tones in a meeting concerting Thule. "I understand your anger better now, and can only hope that one day you can forgive us."

"Don't," Harry answers calmly. "Just move past it. It can't be undone, but we can learn from it."

"You truly will not give any of us any authority after this, will you?"

"When I find one among you who can handle the responsibilities that authority demands and not wield it so carelessly, I might." Harry nods. "You're a good captain and probably the best general I could have under the circumstances, so stick to that, Valeo."

"...as the Guardian wishes."

248.

Trebal heads back to the Thule and stays there for the following months, preceding the breaking up of the asteroid and only contacting Atlantis via the Stargate. Valeo tells Harry that she is contemplating and reflecting on her actions, intending to learn from them, but Harry finds he doesn't care one way or another, just as long she does her job and only her job. Thankfully, he has Irana at the site to make sure nothing… more was being done, and when Trebal sticks to her work, Harry relaxes a little.

Phoenix is a little harder to crack, though. The boy has barely finished the introductory book, before he begins arguing against magic. "The mere concept that you can control this power via _words_ and _wooden sticks_ is ludicrous," the boy snorts, throwing the book to the table. "Obviously these are silly superstitious concepts created from thin air to help a lesser, primitive species understand their specialised talents."

"And yet, when I do this, you can obviously see the effect and the point of origin for the power. _Leviosa_," Harry says, flicking his wand and sending the boy floating across the room. Phoenix splutters with outrage and scowls at him, but gives the wand a thoughtful look. "Every time I use my powers, it is through a wand and a word. If it works, and believe me it does, then how can it be ludicrous and superstitious concept created by primitive species?"

"Perhaps some sort of organic conductor," Phoenix murmurs. "The part about the words is still ridiculous. This type of power does not work by _invoking_ it."

"Do you have proof of that statement, or are you saying it just because you haven't been able to do it yourself?"

249.

Magic or magical understanding doesn't come easy for Phoenix. It relies too much on imagination and belief, and the boy has been taught in the Alteran ways of only accepting something as the truth only after it had been proven scientifically. It amuses Harry a little that the boy can believe in meditation and the ascension to a higher plane of existence, but he can't believe magic even when he sees it in action, but as the boy's frustration turns worse and he begins really slamming down the books he tries to read, Harry figures that maybe reading isn't the way to go.

When the Olatains ask him to join them in yet another small celebration about the re-growth of their world, he commands Phoenix to come with him. He has to make it an order because, despite his obvious curiosity about other worlds, Phoenix declines out of principle, not wanting to agree with him about anything. After that, Harry feels he understands the boy a little more - if nothing else, he begins to see the heights of the boy's pride. Leticia had really spoiled the boy there, intentionally or not, and even after weeks in Atlantis Phoenix still thinks he's the, well, the chosen one. It's not a pride Harry is unfamiliar with, but he has to wonder if he was ever as bad.

It also really makes Harry wants to shake Leticia at times and ask what the hell she was thinking, raising the kid that way.

250.

In Olar Harry gets the habit of slapping Phoenix lightly to the back of his head every time he mutters "primitive race" because, well, the boy does it a _lot_. Harry also finds that he gets a kick out of seeing the boy taking part in the work around the young forests. Despite his _higher education_, Phoenix has been raised in fairly simplistic ways in a place where all one has is hand made and grown, and getting his hands dirty is something the boy is not adverse against. He's even better at it than majority of the Olatains, who are more used to their forests just being there, rather than having to maintain them.

After seeing the worst of the boy's prideful and somewhat arrogant personality, for Harry it's like seeing Draco Malfoy roll up his sleeves and start gardening - especially since Phoenix has a practical, casual ease about the way he digs his shovel into the ground. It's hilarious.

"Cheater," the boy mutters to him as Harry uses his wand to upturn a long strip of land, but there is a spark of jealousy and longing in his eyes. The elder wizard grins, feeling that they might finally be getting somewhere.

xx

I love giving Harry some family problems. For those wondering, yes, I have plans for Travellers, and Ronon, and the Tower, and the Hippaforalkus/Orion, we'll get to all of them eventually.

My apologies for possible grammar errors and such.


End file.
